


The Opal & The Sapphire

by clockworkrobots



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Community: deancasbigbang, Depression, Happy Ending, M/M, Minor Character Death, Past Dean/Other, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-12
Updated: 2013-11-12
Packaged: 2018-01-01 04:55:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 28,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1040585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockworkrobots/pseuds/clockworkrobots
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Six years ago, Dean Winchester’s family suffered a horrible tragedy when his father drowned at sea—a death which, ever since, Dean blames himself for. </p>
<p>Six years later, a mysterious man by the name of Castiel Milton moves into town, and strikes up a quick and surprisingly intimate relationship with Dean. But Castiel has a past with a dark and intricate connection to Dean’s own, and what solace they’ve managed to build in each other’s arms risks shattering under the weight of their collective regrets when all is revealed one night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Sea

**Author's Note:**

> This is the biggest fic endeavour I've ever undertaken so I was definitely writing up until the last minute, and therefore I'd like to offer immense thanks to Elaine (maybejustcreation on tumblr) and Nicole (dtkrushnics) for offering their generous last minute beta services!!
> 
> Also huge thanks to Audrey for being my lovely and understanding artist! Check out her art masterpost [here](http://yoitsaudrey.livejournal.com/748.html)!

__

 

_O the opal and the sapphire of that wandering western sea,_  
 _And the woman riding high above with bright hair flapping free—_  
 _The woman whom I loved so, and who loyally loved me._

**— _Beeny Cliff_ , Thomas Hardy**

**  
*****

  

 

_June, 2006_

 

Faintly, Dean can hear the waves crash against the rocks outside, behind the house. On any other night, sounds like these would lull him to sleep, the white noise of whitecaps breaking against the edges of the cove wrapping him in a serene sense of home. It chills him to the bone tonight, though, piercing through the shadows in his memory and recalling the taste of rain and loss, rising as acid on the back of his tongue.

The night air is clear tonight, but Dean’s thoughts remain shrouded. It’s been three weeks since the incident, since some part of him shattered and was carried off to be swallowed by the waves. He wonders now if he had not already been broken, if the cracks had been drawn long before he set foot on that boat and all he needed was one bad step to finally break.

Or maybe it didn’t matter now either way, how it started. His was father gone, slipped from his hands. Regardless of where it might have all began, in the end, there was only him to blame.

He shuffles around in his sheets for a few minutes more before giving up on the endeavour of sleep altogether. There will be no silence for him tonight, so, he thinks to himself, might as well make something of it.

Throwing back his cover he steps barefoot onto the worn wooden floor, wiggling his toes against the grain of it for a moment before getting up, and padding across his darkened room. On his way towards the door he picks up an old woollen sweater he’d thrown across the chair at his desk the morning before. Pulling it over his head, Dean smiles that it still smells like his mother’s washing. At least there’s one thing that hasn’t changed.

He creeks the door open slowly, trying to be as quiet as possible to not disturb his mother, still asleep, hopefully, down the hall. His smile falls into a frown, however, when he thinks that this will be the nineteenth night in a row that she’s had to sleep alone.

It's a bitter thought that creeps up on him that it is just them in this house now.

Stealing himself for a moment against his night time demon, he creeps carefully to the kitchen, the linoleum tile of the floor a offering a smooth chill to his feet as he collects a mug from a cupboard for a round of 4:00 A.M. coffee. Dean thinks he should have thought to put on socks, for the way his cold toes begin to climb their chill up to the rest of his body, but decides against the effort of walking all the way back to his room. He’ll sooner retreat to the shed out back first, going sock-less in his shoes, than retreat to his room that still faces the water.

Soon, he forgets the early morning uneasiness he’d felt by the jolt of caffeine in his veins, and the feeling of his hands on the bare wood grain as he fiddles around in his makeshift wood-shop in the shed. It isn’t much of a proper workshop _really_ , barely warranting the moniker, but it is Dean’s small little studio space, he supposes, his own sanctuary to occupy his hands with--to make them steady when they shake.

His father had never much cared for his hobby, too attached to the water and its sure swelling to understand the desire to stay ashore for long hours, hidden in a shed, making tables and trinkets for no one but himself. Their living, John Winchester has always said, was _fishing_ , and therefore Dean should want to become an expert at _that_ instead. Dean had always been proficient and the the family business, and a hard worker 'til the end, but in he cavernous space that John left in the family when he died, Dean can almost hear his admonishments ring off the walls, as if his ghost still inhabited the place, echoing on and on.

Dean shakes his head to rid himself of that thought, and the dark trail it would lead him to again, and sets himself to work.

 

 

***

 

 

_April, 2006 (Three Weeks Earlier)_

 

The rough and rocky sea-soaked beaches along the edges of the town had long been a site of local legend. Down through the decades and generations of fishermen’s families, stories were told by lamplight of the ghosts of the waters, of sea creatures and mermaids and dark things that climbed out of the deep. They were stories of local people, sightings retold through skewed memories to make a child gasp or a spouse balk. But there were old stories, too, brought over from older lands, where the myths and monsters of forgotten ages ran as free as the wind against the sea.

These were hardly things people believed in anymore, in this day and age, of course, but rare was child of Carver Cove that could not excitedly recall a tale or two of the strange shadows off the coast. Rare, indeed, was a fisher’s kin who did not know the danger of a selkie’s pelt, or of a siren’s song, even if it was never something they _really_ believed in.

But perhaps they would have done well to.

The ocean was cold, that night, and not in the way it usually was; the air was not brisk but chilling, biting to the bone in a way not even a seasoned sailor could rebel against. It was wet, too, and not in the way, of course, that water is usually wet, but that the rain came down hard and the decks of the ships that dared at all to brave the tides were quickly swept up into a storm.

Many would have drowned were it not for a fisher’s career requiring a little bit of cowardice in this regard, and most vessels quickly turned back.

Except for one.

The Winchesters had always been a well regarded family among the local population, if not a little estranged by geography, living just on the brim of the town limits. Few still living could remember when the original homestead had been built, but anyone could tell you that those Winchesters were mighty good with their hands, and that the wooden family home sitting on the crest of a small and craggy cliff could withstand even the worst of winter weather.

Frankly, it was never the home anyone was worried about, only the sometimes foolish tendency of the family’s father to venture out onto the water even in the worst of conditions, weather be damned. _Oh, that John Winchester is a good sailor,_ they all would say, _but it’s exactly that that’ll get him killed one day_.

It was then, indeed, to everyone’s annual surprise, that John Winchester lived to fish another season, and so began a legend (as these things do) of him being blessed by an underwater faerie, or perhaps even a god. No townsfolk ever had any _fact_ for these rumours, but it was a fun game to play down the pub or ‘round the school yard, what deal exactly Winchester might have made.

Dean, the eldest of his sons, was long familiar with the rumours and stories that floated around about his father, almost as a distinguished air of mystery. He’d always resented them a bit himself, if only because the inaccuracy evaded the truth of what _Dean_ knew about him. Dean's relationship with John had not been loveless, but it was not terribly forgiving. John has always been a very no-nonsense kind of man, stubborn to the bone, and a man who would sooner scoff at fairytales than entertain them. He was not an unkind man, but he was shortsighted in the more figurative sense, and sometimes Dean thought his father spun more tales about the world than were ever told of him for all his rigidity.

The first tall-tale would be that it was every Winchester’s duty to become a fisherman, as it was already foiled by the fact that John's youngest son, Sam, had gone off to college and a pre-law track by the time Dean was not twenty-five. It had always been Sam's destiny and not Dean's to leave, and indeed it was one of Dean's greatest delights to see it finally happen for his brother, who'd always had big dreams of big cities and big places, where the roads never ended dramatically to drop off at a cliff.

Of course, this left Dean to pick up the mantle of the family legacy, one which he did dutifully with all the happy logic that this was just the way it was supposed to be. If you asked anyone in the town before _the incident_ , they would have said that Dean was born to follow his father, and this was something that, for a long time, Dean believed, too.

Change is both a chaotic and constant creature though, and as the skies blackened and the rain fell, change was what charged the clouds with static as lightning began to strike.

  

 

***

 

 

The morning of the storm is one Dean will remember in vivid detail for years to come, but initially it was as ordinary a day as any other.

His mother, not knowing what had happened until a day later, would not remember, for instance, the argument father and son had that morning with much clarity. Disagreements between Dean and his father were becoming more commonplace, after all (especially after the departure of Sam from the house, who'd always been somewhat of a buffer), and usually were resolved by the time their boat pulled into dock in the evening.

That day's tiff was more than just a dispute or a disgruntlement indelicately expressed, however, as when Dean woke up to the greying skies and chipper air he knew then and there they ought not to go out. It was a matter of danger. But his father would not listen, and so though it had not yet begun to rain when they left dock that morning, they remained the only vessel on the water. By the end of the night, their small little family fishing boat would not even be able to boast that.

 

 

***

 

 

It's the wind that pierces his skin more than the water flying with it. The wetness, of course he’s used to, and the choppy weather, too, to an extent. But winds this large and this chaotic are seldom seen except in history books, and Dean doubts he’s old enough to remember the last time they saw something of this magnitude. He’s heard stories though, of storms from decades ago, so massive they wrecked the entire coastline for miles, docks destroyed and roofs fallen in. Eyeing the clouds and skyline as they darken to a depressingly ominous grey, Dean thinks the one closing in today might just sweep the entire coast _away_ instead. 

The rain began falling in earnest around mid morning, when they were already far enough out in the water that the hopeful idea that the storm would eventually let up prevented them from turning back. By the time it became too much, of course, it was a lost cause, for neither Dean nor John could scarcely see the shore lines anymore through the thick sheets of raindrops, falling like heavy pellets.

“Dean!” John yells through the howl of the damp, calling his son over to help him reel their nets in so they can make some kind of attempt to make a break for shore.

Wiping water from his eyes, Dean suppresses a shiver and makes his way across the small, slippery deck of the boat to help hasten the pace of their departure. He tries not to think of anything but the task at hand, of the way his hands carefully grip the ropes and haul the nets in, but ever darker in the corners of his mind looms the encroaching sense of danger

“We should head for the cove instead of port,” Dean cries over the crashing of the waves against their hull. Spray splashes up into his open mouth and he spits the salty water out, looking to his father desperately for a quick answer.

All he can see through the haze of rain is his father nodding his head. His lips move as if to say something but the waving gesture he makes is all Dean needs to know to head back to the cabin and grab the wheel. The deck is slippery as he makes his way across it, holding onto the side for balance. Behind him, he can hear his father gather up the last of their nets.

A loud cry from the same direction, though, makes Dean stumble in his step, tripping into the outer wall of the cabin. He turns around just in time to see his father slide and jerk sideways by a phantom tugging force as the boat tips dangerously to the right. John's head bangs against the metal siding.

Dean struggles to maintain his own balance while trying to call out to his father. His knuckles are turning white with how tensely he's gripping the outer railing, trying to get to his dad, who looks like he's second away from passing out with the force of the blow.

The boat rocks again. Harder this time, as a huge waves hits then and spills over the deck.

Dean barely has time to breath before he sees his father topple over with the motion, over the side of the boat into the deep.

He runs forth, upwards as the boat tips left again, throwing himself against the side to see if he can spot his father close. All he can see is blue-black waves and whitecaps. There is no sign of his father in sight.

He blinks away water from his lashes, but it's a fruitless effort. It's a good thing he know his way around their small ship instinctively, because he can't _see_ anything in this. He feels his way to the railing he knows should be on the outside wall of the cabin, legs tense so has not to slip. But before he can get his grounding and grasp it, _another_ giant wave rocks the boat, sending Dean stumbling into the cabin wall, knocking his head against the painted metal. A sharp pain pierces through his skull, and he's too stunned to swear.

The last thing Dean remembers before the black swallows him is a shadow swimming near the surface as he falls under.

 

 

***

 

 

He wakes to a disorienting, buzzing feeling in his head. His limbs feel numb and soaked through to his marrow, but he’s _alive_. He’s... half sure of it.

Dean cracks his eyes open to find that he’s laying back against the sand, face tipped towards the sky. Overhead, a seagull caws, circling underneath clearing skies. A gentle tide laps at his feet.

As his consciousness returns he realises he's _freezing_ , which he distantly supposes is a symptom of lying on wet sand all night and nearly dying in a hurricane as his evening entertainment. He sits up as his winged friend lands nearby, coughing against the straining, heavy feeling in his chest and the dryness in his throat. His throat though, is probably the only part of his body that _is,_ he clothes soaked through so thoroughly he's surprised he didn't die of hypothermia while he was out. His skin feels sticky under the weight of all the salt, but as his memory from the night before returns, a horrible dread washes over him that sweeps all minor irritation away.

Dean scrambles up, looking around frantically, up and down the beach for the sign of someone else.

“Dad!” he tries to shout, but his voice is too hoarse for it to come out as anything more that a strangled half-cough.

He squints against the wind, raising his hand against his forehead like a visor to peer down the coast. “Dad!” he tries for again, louder this time.

He chooses a direction at random to jog down the beach, muscles screaming out for him to stop, but he knows he _can't_ , _not when Dad might be_ —

He refuses to think it.

Dean's mind flashes back to his father's wide eyes as the waves swallowed him, the call of Dean's name the last words he spoke as he fell into the sheets of rain, pulled back into the deep. Dean's hands hadn't been quick enough. _It was my fault_ , he thinks, guilt searing through his system as he gasps, choking back a shocked sob.

It's as he turns the corner around a jutting piece of rock that he sees him, his sprawled, still form a dark contrast to the calm beige of the beach.

“Dad, you okay? _Dad!_ ” he calls out as he runs towards him, diving down to his knees when he reaches his side. His fingers scramble at his father's collar to check his pulse as he leans his head down to listen for the sounds of life in him yet.

 _He's not breathing,_ Dean panics.

“No, no, no—” he whispers frantically, cupping his father's rough and stoic face, even in sleep. “Dad, you can hear me, right? _Please,”_ he begs, but it's to no avail. _Try CPR,_ a rational voice inside him says, and he shakes himself to clear his head before he unzips his father heavy jacket, before pressing his hands over his chest. He performs the compressions as rapidly as he was taught.

“Don't you _dare_ die on me,” he grinds out in a desperate whisper, a mantra rolling in his head of _Check pulse, check breathing. Repeat._

By the end of his third set of chest compressions, Dean plops backwards into the sand, stunned and defeated. Overhead the same seagull from before—or maybe a new one, who knows, taunts him with their incessant cries, as Dean sits and stares at his father's lifeless body, a monument to his failure.

“I should move him,” he tells himself, voice flat and dry.

He closes his eyes, taking a deep breath of the salty, humid air. He doesn't even know where they _are_ though. For all he knows they could be miles down the coast, and miles from any home or road that might give him any clue. Should he leave the body here while he gets help? Dean almost wants to laugh bitterly at that thought— _the body_.

Not a day ago did his father have a name, a _life_ , and a withering scowl as he rebuffed Dean's protests that it was too dangerous to leave the house. Now he was just a body, and all because Dean _couldn't reach_.

He looks at his father's hands, at the fingers that will never move again to clap Dean on the shoulder, to hold his mother's cheek. Dean silently yearns for them to twitch, just once, but they remain unmoved, wrinkled and dirty from the sand and rain. Rolling back onto his haunches he picks one up, and holds it in his own. The wedding ring on his father's left hand is missing, he notes idly.

“I told you,” he whispers with regret. “I fucking _told_ you not to leave.”

Dean doesn't know how long he stays there, soaked and still, and maybe it doesn't matter. He comes back to himself when he feels his eyes sting with a different kind of wetness than the rain or sea. Blinking in surprise, he realises belatedly that he's been crying. He wishes, with a heavy sense of sadness, that he could at least have the ring to give back to his mother, imagining her clutching it in her fist as she cried in Dean's arms. At least she would have _something_.

It's that thought that decides it for him, because he can't just leave his father _here_. He'll have to bring him home himself.

Moved with renewed mission, Dean drops the dead hand, and shifts onto his heels to picks up his father's limp body, grunting under the weight of it. Cerebrally he know the adrenaline driving him will wear off soon, but he can hopefully make it to road by then.

As he makes his way up the beach towards some sort of shelter, Dean doesn't even stop to think of how on Earth _he_ managed to wash ashore alive, when he had been thrown into the storm just like John had. What use was musing over miracles, when his father was dead?

 


	2. The Opal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a little warning, I suppose: there's a lot of internal turmoil going through Dean's mind in this, and that's what the "depression" warning is for! I sort of used this fic as my own outlet during a very hard time for myself, too, so some of that leaks through. 
> 
> As well, since this _is_ from Dean's p.o.v., I should also say his reaction to Cas' sexuality is in no way a reflection of my own opinions! Simply how I thought Dean would conceive of that revelation.  <3

 

 

_June, 2012_

 

The stranger’s name was Castiel Milton, and that was all pretty much anyone had on him. Indeed, no one in their small town could even attest that that _was_ his real name.

As expected in a town like theirs, the theories were immediate and endless. For all they knew, as the increasingly outrageous stories went, he was a convict on the run. _Maybe he was a writer from the city, looking to get away_ , they whispered. _Maybe he was an eccentric philanthropist who wanted to make their community his cause_ , others more cynically wondered.

Dean Winchester didn’t think he was any of those things, only that he was a strange man in a small, strange town, and for that, Dean felt a bit sorry for him. Then again, Dean had also never met him; maybe this Castiel Milton knew _exactly_ what he was getting into.

In fact, Castiel Milton’s sudden and sensational arrival had been a hot topic of town gossip for a good two weeks before Dean even laid eyes on him. He'd heard about is arrival down the lane from the Braeden's from his mother, moving into a ramshackle little farmhouse that couldn't by much right boast itself a farm anymore to go with it, but hadn't had the time to drop in and check. Dean had planned to, of course, to offer his services to help do the place up if the guy would have it, but his other projects proved consuming enough that it was days before he ever really truly emerged from his wood-shop to spy the light of day, let alone ask after a stranger.

He might have forgotten for another two weeks on top of that if Lisa Braeden hadn't called and asked him to drive out and pick up her son Ben, who was apparently out there at the guy's new place on the edges of town, where the village started sprawling out into country side, helping the guy move in. Dean thought privately that it wasn't so far that Ben couldn't bike or walk home himself, especially as the Braedens were now Milton's closest neighbours, but Lisa was understandably doting, and Dean, happy to offer his baby out for rides. He needed _some_ opportunity to show her off, after all, and his '67 Impala wasn't exactly suitable for furniture deliveries. He used the van for that, bought after he'd sold off his dad's old boat, which meant these days he spent more time in _it_ than in his steel black steed. Picking up Ben, then, was as good an excuse as any to take her out for a spin, catch up with the kid, and see just what was up with their new neighbour.

And that's how Dean finds himself on Milton's sagging doorstep, wearied wood creaking under the weight of a robust six foot tall man as he knocks on the peeling door frame. The inner door was left open at some point, and so the only thing between in the inside and the open air is a pitiful looking screen door that Dean half fears would wither under his touch. Before he can debate the risks of testing it against its hinges, however, a deep voice from down the hall beckons him in.

“In the living room,” it hollers out, which Dean supposes is invitation enough to step inside.

Swinging the screen door delicately, he enters the house. No lights in the hall were left on, but it's still bright enough outside for it to pool in through the door and bathe the path inward with a dusty sheen of sun.

“Hey, um, I'm here to pick-up Ben?” he calls into the house, glancing around the edge of the doorway into what he assumes is supposed to be the living room.

If it was once intended for a sitting area, it is still sparsely furnished even after two weeks of occupancy. Boasting only an old, secondhand looking couch with a garish, but mercifully fading brown plaid pattern, the space is largely populated by boxes, the closest open one indicating to Dean they must all be filled with books. So this guy was an enthusiastic reader, apparently.

“In the kitchen,” the voice calls back, and Dean follows it down the hall behind the living room, to a modest kitchen, where in the middle stands a man, doing dishes in the sink. With the sleeves of his blue line shirt are rolled up to his elbows to keep out of the way of the water, he turns to Dean when he appears, draping the wet rag he'd been using over the curve of the faucet.

“He's out back,” he supplies with a head tilt towards the kitchen window, that looks out onto the overgrown grassy fields of the former farm's property.

The man squints at him, assessing. “You are Benjamin’s father?” he asks.

Dean laughs lightly at the use of Ben's whole name, wondering if that's why the boy had escaped to the outdoors. “I hope you didn’t call him that.”

If possible, the man's eyes narrow further with a frown. “It’s his name,” he comments, as if it were absurd this piece of knowledge should escape Dean.

“Yeah,” Dean drawls. “But I’ve never heard him listen to anyone who doesn’t call him 'Ben'. Unless it’s his mom,” he adds.

Milton nods, face relaxing again, and it's then that Dean notices the man's eyes. They are fucking _blue_. If he were ever to admit to being a sappy little shit at heart, Dean might say as blue as the fucking ocean, but he'll save that for the Hallmark card he'll never write. His gaze is steady and open, and it compels Dean to take a step inside the kitchen.

“I will keep that in mind, Mr. Braeden.”

“Winchester,” Dean immediately corrects, as if it were _crucial_ that the man before him think he wasn't married. Shaking off the strange, sudden feeling, instead, he blames the desperate impulse to clarify on not having had to tell anyone before; everyone in town always knew.

“Excuse me?”

“I’m not—I’m not Ben’s dad,” he explains. “My name’s Dean Winchester, ‘m more of a family friend, I guess,” he says, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “Did date his mom for awhile,” he adds in the spirit of honesty, “but we stayed close. I look after Ben now and again, and his mom’s at work right now, so she called and asked if I could come pick him up.” He shrugs.

“Ah, my apologies then, Mr. Winchester.”

“Dean.”

“Dean, then,” Castiel amends, and the corner of his lips quirks up. “Do you generally make a habit of constantly correcting people?”

“Only when they need to be,” Dean smiles, with his most charming sense of cheek.

Castiel's receiving look is blank and unrevealing, but Dean imagines beneath the dry delivery there is something close to playful tone in his voice when he responds, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

But with that final word, it leaves Dean standing somewhat awkwardly in the guy's kitchen without anything much left to offer or say. “So, should I just...?” he trails off, pointing towards the back.

“Oh, yes, you can go out if you want,” he says, moving past Dean out the kitchen to a similarly shaky looking screen door, peering out as if to spot his younger guest. “He might be in the shed, by now,” he guesses, when Dean comes up behind him and neither can spot Ben amongst the grass.

“Cool, thanks,” Dean offers, hand already on the door handle to step outside and search out Ben himself. But he pauses, turning towards his host with an expectant look. “I didn't catch your name,” he says out of politeness, not wanting to admit to his reception to the rumour mill.

The man smiles, a soft expression a surprising contrast to his sharp, scruffy face. “I assumed you'd heard of me already, everyone I've met in so far seems to have,” he says knowingly, but extends his hand all the same. “Castiel Milton.”

Dean looks down at the hand as he takes it, eyes trailing along the lines of his fingers, lithe artful things that Dean imagines provide a tender touch. But Castiel's grip is strong and forthright, even if his skin is a little cold, a contrast to Dean's rough, weathered but warm hands. When he looks up, Castiel is staring, mouth open as if in barely suppressed astonishment. Dean drops his hand quickly in embarrassment, and wipes his palms on his pants, suddenly self-conscious.

“Sorry if I'm a bit sweaty,” he tries to laugh off. “Just got off work myself before I drove down.”

“I'm sorry you felt compelled to come out on our account,” Castiel says apologetically. “I would have driven Benjamin— _Ben_ —home myself if I had a vehicle.”

It's a revelation that surprises Dean. He's always loved living out here, and hair swept with sea breeze and lungs filled with country air is his preferred state, but he can't imagine what it would feel like to not have at least the _choice_ of mobility.

“Whoa, dude, you don't have a _car?_ How do you live in the middle of nowhere and not drive?”

It's Castiel's turn to shrug, a stiff motion that seems almost new to him. “Sheriff Mills drove me to the house when I first arrived, but before then I managed to catch a lift with a very kind gentleman from the city, who was going on to a village several more miles up the road,” he explains as if the journey was no burden to organise with such personal limitations. Hell, Dean doesn't really know him, it might not have been.

“I wanted chance to sort my affairs out here before acquiring anything new,” he continues, gesturing at nowhere in particular as if to say making house actually _liveable_ was his main priority at the moment.

“Been holed up here ever since?”

“No,” Castiel elaborates. “I've been into town, down the road to the Braeden's too, more than once, as Ben will attest,” he smiles, expression growing somewhat wistful. “I'm very fond of walking.”

Dean nods. “I'll say, that's quite a hike.” He wonders why Castiel didn't just get a small house in the town centre instead of in the outskirts, though perhaps he simply likes it out here. Not that their town is particularly loud, but it _is_ lively for their modest population, certainly _nosy_ too—perhaps he likes the peace and privacy.

Then he remembers all the books. There might literally be _tonnes_ of them. “Wait, how did all your stuff get here?”

“Ah, well, my books just arrived this morning actually. Hired movers,” Castiel explains, walking back down the hall way through to the living room where his paper bound audience awaits. The floorboards creak as Dean follows close behind, and arrived under the threshold, Castiel sweeps his arm out to gesture at the piles of unpacked boxes. There have to be _dozens_ of stacks of them, Dean notes, impressed. “Which is what Ben was here for. There are, as you can see, quite a few,” Castiel continues.

Understatement.

“He helped me bring them in. It's been a lonely fortnight without them.”

 _Fortnight?_ Dean chuckles inwardly. The guy may be carried by a strange sort of stiffness, but he has his charm in his own way. He speaks like he's straight out of _Little Women,_ which may or may not be incredibly alluring to Dean. He'll plead the fifth.

“The only other person I know with a library this big is Bobby—You met Bobby?” he asks, more rhetorically than anything, for he quickly waves the question off, seeing Castiel's blank look. “You will—but he has some _weird_ stuff, and not even all in English.”

Dean's pretty sure Bobby has a whole _shelf_ of books, ages unknown, in Japanese, but no one in town could ever tell him where the hell Bobby had learned it. His sort of surrogate father figure (certainly true after his dad had died, but even before he'd always been there for Dean and his brother both), Bobby had always welcomed Dean and Sam as kids in to rifle among his stacks, so long as they promised not to rips the pages out.

This anecdote seems to please Castiel, expression colouring in delight at the appreciation of knowledge in a way so very reminiscent of Sam that Dean's heart clenches a bit.

“Oh, there are many languages among mine as well. I have... diverse interests,” he states, and Dean waits for him to elaborate, but he never does. Fair enough, Dean supposes, everyone has their cherished secrets.

The ensuing lull in conversation reminds Dean that it's getting on dinner time, and Ben remains undelivered to his home. Walking back to the door to see himself out, intending to catch Ben around the back before they bundle off into the Impala, an idea comes to him. He turns around when he's out on the step.

“Listen, this might be a bit forward, I don't know, but it's just my mom and me up at ours, and we got more than enough food for two people. You're welcome for dinner, if you're hungry,” Dean proposes, and not simply out of neighbourly duty.

It's true, that though they've adjusted to their emptying house over the years, with his father's death half a decade ago and his little brother moving out just months before the tragedy, they still long for company. Dean and his mom being cut from the same cloth, they both thrive when among friends and a meal just as warm.

“Plus I got a little moonshine stewing in my workshop, for something heartier,” he adds, to sweeten the pot.

“Oh,” Castiel says, surprise painted across his face before it falls in regret. “I'm afraid I'll have to decline.”

Dean tries not to let his own disappointment show, so he quickly covers with, “No worries, man.”

“Some other night, perhaps,” Castiel offers by way of consolation. “Ben's mother has already invited me to dinner for tonight.”

 _Yeah, I bet she has,_ Dean thinks, with just a bit of jealousy. Huh. He'll analyse _that_ later. Or never. Never is probably safer.

Out loud he just says, “I can at least drive you both down,” and Castiel nods his head.

“That would be very much appreciated.”

 

 

***

 

 

Dean tries his best not to think of the man for the rest of the night, but it's a hard task. It's almost as if Castiel Milton is both familiar and a stranger, and that dissonance is both fascinating and unsettling. He moves into a house that's falling apart into a town in which he knows no one, who _does_ that?

What is he running from? Or what is he running _to?_

On the road home from Lisa's, the sky dark, and his own house lighting up the lane as a beacon in the distance, Dean shakes his head. If Castiel has a story to tell, he'll tell it in his own time.

 

 

***

 

 

Dean gets his answer to one of his burning questions, however, the next morning. Really, it's a mystery the whole town has been yearning to know the answer to for weeks: what was Castiel Milton _doing_ here? It figures that it would be for a job.

A job that Dean becomes privy to when he drives into town for food and sees Castiel leaning against a car outside the sheriff's station, across the street from the general store.

“ _Shit,_ you're with the sheriff,” Dean finds himself saying out loud as he approaches, walking across the road to meet him.

“Hello, Dean,” Castiel greets him with.

Their conversation from yesterday comes rushing back to Dean. Did he really offer illegal alcohol to an _officer of the law?_

“Listen, I _totally_ lied about the moonshine, I was just being... hospitable,” he rushes out with.

Castiel raises an eyebrow. He sighs as he lifts off from his leaning perch against the driver's side door of the car. “Right, I'd forgotten to arrest you for that.”

He straightens up, and moves a hand to his side, supposedly reaching for his handcuffs.

“Uh—” Dean stutters. Well, _this_ hadn't been in his plans for the day.

Noticing his panic, Castiel freezes, and then actually cracks a _smile_. “I'm joking.”

 _Jesus fucking Christ,_ Dean huffs in his head. Out loud he lets out a relieved breath and says, “Heavy sense of humour, dude.”

Castiel nods as if this is sage but not necessarily _new_ advice. “I've been informed of that before.”

“I'll bet,” Dean huffs, and then finally takes a moment to properly take Castiel's appearance in. He's got the whole uniform on, beige shirt and brown pants, and thick, functional belt pulled tight. He actually looks _really_ good. He also looks really serious.

He squints at Dean. “Perhaps you should show me some respect. I could still throw you in,” he points back to the station with a thumb, where Dean knows first hand they have a few lock-up cells.

For another terrifying moment, Dean can't discern whether the guy is for real or not. Dean had spent time in the station over night before after all, in the worst of his days after his father's death, too drunk to drive home by himself from the Roadhouse bar the Harvelles own up the block. He hadn't been _arrested_ , exactly, just strongly persuaded to sleep it off under Sheriff Mills' watch in one of the cells. It only happened once or twice, though Dean's memory is still somewhat hazy of those few months, but he does remember his mom coming to pick him up the next morning, holding him while he hugged her on the cot. Face buried in her golden hair, Dean had whispered as he cried that he was sorry. His mother, mourning too, would kiss his hair and tell him _Don't be, I still have you._

It occurs to him then that Jody might have already told Castiel these stories about him, and a sense of dread washes over his body. But then Castiel raises that brow of his again, as if to concede the charade, and the feeling lifts.

 _Asshole_.

“ _Deputy_ Milton, huh?” Dean nods, looking at the badge on Castiel's chest. “You should have said.”

Castiel appears to hear some sort of resentment in his voice, for he does grimace slightly, apologetic. “It didn't seem relevant before,” he states in his defence, which Dean has to agree is true. He might have been less inclined to invite him in on imbibing illegal alcohol if he had known, but their town has a good relationship with the sheriff's department, and Dean's family better than most, so it's not like the knowledge would have soured Dean's interest in acquaintance.

Still, he wonders why Castiel concealed his reason for being in the town for so long. If it's because he didn't want to be noticed, he _really_ took the wrong job for that.

“Everyone was wondering about you, you know,” Dean admits. “Where you came from, who you were. Would've shut them up pretty fast if you told them you worked for Sheriff Mills.”

“And where would the fun in that be?” Castiel responds dryly, and Dean wonders if his initial assessment of Castiel as an overly stiff kind of guy was entirely wrong. He has a very subtle and sarcastic sense of humour, and Dean kind of likes it.

He also seems to also use that dryness to subvert prying questions about his intentions and origins, for Dean realises he didn't take the bait on what Dean was leading him towards at all. “You're very good at evasion,” he notes, but he's not accusing. He's prepared for a long game.

“I'm very good at a lot of things, Mr. Winchester,” he replies in turn, so downright enigmatically that Dean almost blushes. But before Dean can reveal the extent of his confounding attraction to Castiel's rugged air of mystery, Castiel launches up from his renewed recline against the car door behind him, to turn around and open it. He gets inside. It appears this is a goodbye.

“Not at lying, you're not,” Dean suddenly feels compelled to point out. “You _do_ have a car.”

Inside, Dean can see Castiel frown through the window, before he roles the thing down and asks Dean to repeat himself. He does, and Castiel looks down at his hands on the wheel. “It belongs to the office,” he explains. “I didn't start until today.”

Dean hums in acknowledgement, and grips the window sill with both hands to lean his head down to Cas' level. It's a fair explanation, but now Dean kinda feels like a dick for being so weirded out over his car-less situation before.

“I promise I wasn't intentionally misleading you,” Castiel promises, sensing Dean's unsettlement, before he grimaces at Dean's continued silence. “I apologise if my obfuscation offended you.”

“Nah, I'm not offended,” Dean amends, bowing and shaking his head, but then something else about yesterday's meeting comes to him. “Well, only a little,” he looks up again, unashamedly flirtatious grin on his face. “You had dinner with Lisa and not with me.”

“I did say I would be happy to accept an invitation another time.”

“Tonight?”

Castiel grimaces. “Not tonight. The Sheriff is... initiating me.”

Dean nods knowingly, and chuckles. “She's getting you wasted, I get it. Well, another time then. Good luck holding your liquor against her.”

Dean walks away without an accepted invitation yet again, but a tingling sensation emanating from his chest all the way down his arms. It's a weird feeling, because Castiel _himself_ is weird. Blunt and kind in equal measure, he's unlike anyone Dean's ever met before, and it's frustrating as hell because _he_ is frustrating. Dean can't get a read on him, not really, and he doesn't know why he kinda likes Castiel's continual rebuffs of his hospitality as much as he kinda hates it. He's a challenge, that's for sure. And for the first time, in a long time, Dean's excited at the unknown.

 

 

***

 

 

It's a challenge, though, in which his mom evidently beats him in, for Dean arrives home from a delivery a few days later and there Castiel is, sitting in the kitchen with his mother, decked out in his uniform, and chatting over a cup of tea.

At the sound of Dean entering, they both look up.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says in his typically grave tone. His mom smiles at him in turn.

“So you like my mom better than me?” he accuses lightly, hoping Cas gets what he's referring to, and not just sounding like a jealous little boy. He grins back for full effect, and walks over to where his mom is seated to kiss her on the crown of her head. “Can't blame you, I like her better than me too.”

“Actually, I was asking after you,” Cas stands up as a matter of formality. “Your mother was kind enough to invite me inside.”

“You should get Dean to help you out up there. He's a carpenter, you know,” Mary comments, and Dean scrunches his brow in confusion for a second, before he realises they must have been talking about Cas' yet to be properly renovated farm house.

Cas looks surprised with this information, own eyebrows raising into his floppy hairline. “I didn't,” he says, looking at Dean with a new kind of consideration. “I had heard the Winchesters were a fishing family.” Probably from Jody, Dean guesses, although the whole town was familiar with them.

“My dad was,” Dean clarifies stiffly, and leaves it at that.

Castiel nods, accepting his closing of the conversation for now. “Well, thank you Mary, for the refreshments,” he says, turning to her as she stands up herself. Mary crosses the distance between them to encircle Cas in a tight hug, and Cas stands shock still at first, until he relaxes after a beat, and awkwardly returns the hug back with an arm lightly slung around her shoulders. Dean chuckles in amusement—Cas must not be used to hugs at all, poor guy. Lucky he's friends with them now, for the Winchesters are indeed a hugging household. They've always had an easier time of _showing_ their love, rather than saying it.

“It was a pleasure to finally meet you, Deputy,” Mary says when she releases him.

“Castiel, please.”

“Very, well, Castiel.”

“I can still call you Deputy, right?” Dean jokes. “I mean I have sort of an authority thing...” is out of his mouth before he truly realises how flirtatious he's being in front of his own mother.

“You seem to also delight in defying authority if you can get away with it, so by all means, keep referring to me by whatever you wish,” Cas drawls dryly. All the while, Mary is looking knowingly at Dean from behind Cas, as any discerning mother would.

Dean raises a hand to rub at his neck self-consciously under her gaze. “'Cas' it is then. You want me to walk you out?”

Cas ducks his head again as a sort of half-bow to Mary as a final farewell, and then leads the way to the door with Dean close behind him.

“So I guess this sort of counts for getting you out here, huh?” Dean says as he holds the door open and they both step outside onto the front porch. Unlike Cas', theirs is fully kept up. The paint is fading slightly, and Dean's been meaning to re-coat it these past two years, but otherwise it's a beautiful porch, with sturdy wooden railings that are elegant in a simple sort of way.

“I'm sorry that I missed you, but I'm afraid I have to get back on duty,” Castiel says, and does look so deeply apologetic that any minute annoyances Dean might have had about the bad timing wash away in sympathy.

“Don't worry about it,” Dean waves off, because really, he understands as much as he regrets it. “If you have a few secs though, I can show you 'round the back? Give you a bit of a tour?” he proposes hopefully. “The front yard's nice, but our back actually spits out onto the ocean.”

“I have time,” Cas assents, and then they're off.

Making their way around the corner of the house, Dean stays just a few paces ahead of his friend, and therefore doesn't see him graze his hand affectionately over the white wooden siding of the house as he passes. It's classic for this part of the world, common place in a way that makes their house somewhat unremarkable by that fact alone, but Castiel appreciates the craft put into it all the same.

When they make it to the back, the green yard spilling off onto a gentle cliff down to the water, Cas says, “You have a beautiful property,” as he squints off into the distant horizon where the waves meet the sky. His voice sounds almost wistful.

“Yeah,” Dean says as he waits at the edge of the slope to stand next to Cas, hands stuffed in the pockets of his jeans. “I remember when we were kids me and Sammy—my little brother—would come out back here and play 'Shipwreck', pretending we were sailors who'd just been washed ashore.” He smiles at the memory. Sam, when he was smaller than Dean, all scrawny limbs and floppy hair, used to especially love when Dean would speak in a pirate caricature all day, even after they had come inside from playing.

The memory is slightly bittersweet, though, when he thinks of more recent events, and real boats that had graced the waters. “Ironic, considering I guess,” he mutters, more to himself than to Cas, but Cas catches it.

“Considering what?”

Dean shakes his head. “Nothing, I was just—” He sighs, turning his head away. He looks down at the waves crashing against the rocks below, and can taste the salt on his tongue from the sea air. He's always loved that taste, and it gives him a calm sort of courage to open up. “Actually was caught in a shipwreck a few years back.”

“Is that why you stopped fishing?” Cas wonders insightfully.

“Sort of. I mean, I always loved being out on the water, but the job—it was more my dad's gig than mine,” he admits, which is both a lie and the truth. He'd loved fishing because it brought him _out there_ , out onto an endless expanse where his soul felt entirely free. But he also hated that it came with such _obligation_ , and took so much time from his other pursuits, back when woodworking was jut a hobby. His complex relationship with his father, that persistent nagging feeling at the back of his head that he could never ever be himself fully with him—certainly never like how he could be _this_ with Cas, whatever _this_ was, or the tender son he tends to be around his mother—also made it a conflicting experience. Maybe he would have stuck with it if it was never something his father did. Sometimes Dean thinks that was Sam's reason for leaving, too.

“When he died it was just...” Dean trails off, shaking his head. His throat constricts with the familiar guilt, and his heart feels heavy.

Castiel's face is solemn and considering when he turns to look at him, eyes made to look even darker when juxtaposed with the depths of the ocean in front of them.

“It was a catalyst, then. It gave you reason to chase what you really wanted,” he suggests to Dean, and it _should_ offend him—Dean's let far less intrusive comments drive him to storming away—but he doesn't think Cas is _intending_ to sound callous about his father's death. It floors him instead.

Truthfully, when he gave up fishing after his dad died, the woodworking thing was more of a distraction. A distraction he was pretty good at, but never something he ever had any illusions of turning into a career. It sort of just developed into one on its own after people started coming by actually asking to _buy_ his stuff. It was true, that he felt more at home with the wood grain beneath his finger tips than the mesh of nets, but he'd grown up with it far too ingrained in his head that he was nothing but destined for the life of his father.

But then his father lost his life, and suddenly his skin felt too tight and nothing about it felt right. At one point, he'd even imagined his abandonment of the family business as a personal sort of punishment, as if he'd sullied the legacy too much to have any right to continue with it.

Dean frowns, looking down at his feet.

“I've never thought about it like that,” he says, trying not to sound too angry and bitter, hoping the years have calmed him, hoping the evening breeze will whip off the water into his face and ground him again. He clenches his fists in his pockets. A silent minute passes, with nothing but the tide oscillating below them. He lets them go.

He very nearly falls over though when Castiel speaks again. “You don't think you deserve to be happy.”

Dean whips his head up, growl ready in his throat, cursing admonishment on the tip of his tongue, but the sheer _intensity_ of Cas' gaze catches him. Dean feels like his soul is being laid bare before him, and he itches to run back inside.

“Good things do happen,” Castiel says, the rumble of his tone carrying all the weight of his sincerity. Dean's ears are burning.

“Not in my experience,” he bites back, but its venom is more directed at himself. He can't remember anymore when he _didn't_ feel like the omnipresent omen of bad luck, a shadow lagging behind everyone, nemesis to the light. How much of him does Castiel see? How has it not engulfed him yet?

Castiel's head is tilted to the right, a contemplating, steady presence at Dean's side. But whatever mystery he seems to be engaged in uncovering, he doesn't speak of it, and Dean doesn't know if that's a god or bad sign.

“Goodnight, Dean,” is all he says, before he turns around, and leaves Dean alone in the encroaching night.

 

 

***

 

 

“I like him,” is the first thing his mother says when Dean comes back inside, turning around from her spot at the sink where she had been doing dishes, an off-white apron slung around her neck to protect her clothes from the dishwater. It's an innocent enough claim, merely a personal opinion, but Dean just knows it's a little bit pointed, too. He tries very hard not to blush, refusing to look his mother in the eye when he shrugs the feeling of scrutiny off.

“He's... well, _Cas_ , I guess.”

When he finally catches her eye, Mary smiles knowingly at him. Well, that's never a good sign.

“ _You_ like him.”

Dean is the picture of feigned nonchalance when he replies, “Ben likes him. The kid usually has pretty decent taste. Inexplicable interest in those Carver Edlund books notwithstanding.”

His mom gazes at him out of the corner of her eye before she turns around and lets it go. “I always thought you liked those stories,” she says, untying her apron and hanging it up on a hook by the doorway to the dining room.

“Are you kidding me?” Dean scoffs. “I wouldn't be caught dead reading them. It's your _uncool son_ who liked them.”

Dean remembers Sam being _obsessed_ with the _Supernatural_ books when he was in high school, devouring the whole series in two weeks, and mournfully treading around the house like someone had just broken up with him when he found out no more books had ever been published. To be fair, they were never _that_ bad, but Dean was never one much for the horror genre. Sam had also always sworn by H. P. Lovecraft, but Dean could never get into him.

“You wouldn't have any right to call them terrible if you hadn't read them,” his mom teases in a singsong voice, leaving the kitchen and shuffling off down the hall to retire to the living room.

“It was an empirical study!” Dean yells after her, grinning.

 

 

***

 

 

He doesn't see Cas again for days. Which would be normal under any other circumstance, as Dean doesn't have much excuse going into the town centre when he's caught up in a project as he currently is, and Deputy Milton surely has enough to keep Cas busy with petty crime and paperwork around the county. But after seeing the guy everyday for almost a week, it's a weird feeling, and Dean halfheartedly entertains a few excuses that could drive him into town. It's strange because Dean doesn't even really know what it _is_ he wants form Cas, what makes his absence unsettle him so. They're not even really _friends_. Does he want a chance to apologise for flaring up wen Cas prodded at his past? Have Cas apologise to _him_? It's all a bit too confusing, so Dean elects to lose himself in his work.

He stays holed up in his work shop most hours, working on a carved oak table. His last commission finished a couple days ago—a rocking chair for Ms. Missouri down the lane, and so he finally has the free time to return to one of his personal projects. He doesn't really know what he'll _do_ with the extra table when he's finished—they hardly need any more furniture in the house themselves—but the designing of the details on the table legs is a welcome challenge, and a calming task, to lose himself in its precision.

It'll be his first carved table, so he's taking his time on it. He's experimented with smaller pieces before, such as with very small details on cupboard doors, but never something on this scale.

The design had come to him when thumbing through one of Bobby's old books one day, one he remembered from his childhood.

A close family friend, Bobby Singer had had an extensive collection of mythology texts ever since Dean was little. He remembers many a rainy day sitting cross-legged in Bobby's library, pouring over myths and legends of tragic heroes and cursed loves. Some of his favourites had always been about sailors and sea monsters, and impossible creatures that live in the deep, and it was these stories that inspired him. It was not rosettes that twirled on the sides of his table, but tails and tentacles, mermaids and masted ships. He was probably months away from finishing the undertaking, but even in his more relaxed moments, staying up late in bed by lamplight, Dean's mind would be filled with images that he would quickly sketch down.

Idly, he wonders if Castiel would be into buying it, since he has almost no furniture to speak of, but Dean puts that fanciful thought away, blaming it on frivolous hope, fuelled by exhaustion. In fact, he looses time so much, working by the light of his woodshed, that he doesn't even notice a second presence at the door.

“Your mother said I would find you out here,” a voice says in the shadow of the threshold, and Dean very nearly drops his carving knife on his foot in his reeling surprise.

He straightens up to find Cas, out of uniform this time, dressed in an ill-fitting tan overcoat that almost makes him look like a 1920s-type gangster who is very, very lost. For all Dean knows, he might be, because he has no idea what he's doing here.

“Out here most days, yeah,” Dean says, setting down his tools on the the counter top of his work bench, and dragging a sleeve across his sweating forehead.

“What are you making?”

“Ah, nothing much, just a little personal indulgence.”

“I've been told your skills are unmatched by anyone in the county.”

Dean laughs. “I don't know who's been sweet talking me to you, but they definitely have an ulterior motive.”

“It was the Sheriff.”

“Ah there you go,” Dean chuckles. “Her and my mom are pretty close. 'Specially, um, after my dad died. Sheriff lost her own husband and son around the same time in a car accident, so they bonded in their grief.”

Castiel grazes a hand across the finished wood of a nearby chair arm. “And you?” he asks, without looking up.

Dean starts. He's not usually the object of such concern. “What about me?”

The deputy's hand drops from the chair arm and Castiel's eyes find Dean's own. His interest is honest and sincere, and Dean has absolutely _no_ idea what to do about that yet again. “Did you have anyone to... bond with?”

“Well,” he sighs. “I started seeing Lisa a couple months after. Her and Ben were good to me, even if I don't know if I was really good for them.”

He's always going to be grateful for how Lisa received him in those terrible days after John's death. She was nonjudgmental and kind, and so self-less in her regard for him that Dean can hardly believe it. No wonder she was so quick to welcome Cas into the neighbourhood, too. If Dean ever thought he could be what she deserved he might have stayed with her, but no one deserved the burden of a broken boy with the shame of his father's blood on his hands, was Dean's repeated self-admonishment. No, she was better off without him.

“Ben seemed to look up to you a lot,” Cas says gently.

“Yeah, yeah, we've had fun. He's a good kid. Reminds me of myself at that age.”

Castiel quirks an eyebrow. “Determined to make an impression?”

“Hey! You mispronounced 'completely charming',” Dean replies, grinning his best self-defensive smile.

Castiel tries to hide a smile himself, but ultimately fails. Dean's getting very good at coaxing them out, he preens inwardly.

“My mistake, yes.”

 

***

 

 

The ensuing weeks wear on in much the same way life had before Castiel Milton had arrived in town. The previous deputy had been a much more laid back kind of guy, if a bit negligent, and so it was true Castiel's presence on the force did add a certain energy to life in their corner of the world. But Dean's job continued as it normally did, commissions coming in at a steady enough rate to keep them going, thanks to his mother's excellent marketing skills of his talents to anyone who would care to listen—for his mom, most people did—and after the initial rumour mill uproar surrounding Castiel's arrival died down, it was as if nothing much had changed at all.

Dean goes to Bobby's, reads books. Mary has Sheriff Mills over for dinner (at which Dean is able to get some great rookie stories about Cas, as well as learn why the hell they hired out of the area for his job in the first place—apparently Cas was the only applicant). Mrs. Moseley calls to tell Dean how much she appreciated his work for her, and weirdly wishes him good luck just for the sake of it. Dean laughs and thanks her kindly, and feels filled with a strange but good buzz for the rest of the day, spirits lifted.

Riding on some of that good luck of Mrs. Moseley's, Dean runs into Cas again in the grocery store. To be fair, it's always very easy to run into people there fairly literally, for the building is small and the aisles even smaller (the nearest supermarket being a half hour drive away and not worth it for smaller purchases—plus Dean's known the owners here all his life), and therefore it's a place ripe for distracting and awkward conversation.

And, well, is the sight of Cas pretty much _anywhere_ nowadays mighty distracting.

Especially when he's in uniform, because the brown coat and strong belt and ironed shirt do many favours to his body shape, and complement his unusual but striking handsomeness very well, if Dean's appreciative eyes have anything to say about it. Dean's analysed all of this very thoroughly in his mind, mostly at night in the hours that he can't sleep, as the sound of the ocean reminds him of Cas' blue eyes and he feels like the sappiest little shit on earth.

Dean, it would seem, has a crush.

A crush who at least seems very interested in being Dean's friend back, for he's happy to indulge Dean in small talk, even though he looks like the kind of guy who'd smite you if he could, to find such audacity in any other.

“My brother's coming home for the weekend, I'm just picking up some stuff for dinner,” Dean explains of his reason for his shopping run, with an unrestrained exuberance to his voice and step, because he hasn't seen Sam in what feels like _forever_.

Castiel cocks his head, smiling less with his mouth and more with his eyes, which Dean's own can't break away from. “You're a kind brother,” he states appreciatively.

Dean rubs the back of his neck, embarrassed but pleased all at once. Castiel produces such strange feelings in him. “I'm just... doing what I can,” he shrugs.

“I was going to ask you to dinner this weekend myself, but I suppose it's more important for you to spend time with your family,” Cas says in passing, and Dean freezes in the middle of the aisle.

“Wait, _what?_ ” That sounds tantalisingly and dangerously like an offer of a date and Dean doesn't even know where to _start_ with that.

Cas seems to take his surprise as a correction of his impropriety in asking, however. “I'm not mistaken in that you do want to spend time with your family am I—”

“No, no, the dinner part,” Dean clears up quickly.

“Oh,” Castiel blinks, caught off guard for a second time. “Yes. Well, it seems only natural that after having dinner at your house I should return the favour.”

So it's _not_ a date. Dean swallows his disappointment. “Just returning a favour, huh?” Still, it's great of him to offer.

Castiel nods. “Yes.”

“Right. Well, um, yeah, next week maybe?”

Dean hopes he's not imagining the small smile peeking in at the side of Castiel's mouth, nor the way he sees Cas' tense shoulders relax ever slightly. “Excellent,” he says, in a long, steady breath.

“See ya around, Cas,” Dean waves as he walk off.

 

 

***

 

 

By the beginning of fall, Dean was almost lulled into thinking hardly anything could ruin the content fulfillment he'd encountered this summer. Not even the unfortunate phone call from his brother, really, could marr much of it.

“Listen, I'm sorry Dean, but if I don't finish sorting through these depositions by Monday I'll be in serious shit with my boss. I thought about brining them back with me, but then I'd actually spend no time visiting with you and mom. Plus if I put in the extra hours this week, I might be able to stretch more time off in November. I'm really sorry, Dean,” Sam regretfully informs him.

Dean sighs and closes his eyes. “It's alright, Sammy,” he says, pinching the bridge of his nose, and, really, it is. Not that he isn't dying to see him, but more than anything he wants his brother to be _happy,_ and he has so much of his heart set on doing well at this new job of his, that he doesn't want to guilt Sam into choosing. That was too much of dad's gig.

“And hey, at least absence makes the heart grow fonder, right? You'll love me so much by Thanksgiving,” Sam teases.

Dean smirks into the receiver. Some back and forth exchanges between siblings never changes. “Bitch.”

He can hear Sam's laughter down the line. It's a great and missed sound. “Jerk.”

 

 

***

 

 

His weekend plans fallen apart, and his dinner special now unneeded, Dean decides to go out to the Roadhouse instead. Though it is essentially the _only_ bar in town, Dean would also proudly boast it was the _best_ one in miles, and not just because he's close family friends with the Harvelles who own it ever since he was born. Sure, he will admit a little familiar bias was part of this decree, but indeed _The Roadhouse_ was a warm and welcoming sort of place, with a great selection of beers on tap, too, and not to mention the local brews Ellen also sold, making the place kind of a hip tourist destination for the younger crowd from the city in the summer.

With the summer season winding down, however, _The Roadhouse_ was barer of patrons than usual, with only its regulars and locals populating its seats tonight. Including one newly appointed county Deputy, whom Dean spots almost immediately after opening the bar's dark brown doors.

“I thought you would be with your brother this evening,” Cas says when he notices Dean take the stool at the bar beside him. “Unless he's come with you?” he asks, looking around behind Dean to see if he has any company.

“Nah, he couldn't make it,” Dean informs him as he waves to Ellen way at the other end of the bar. “Got tied up at work.”

Castiel hums in understanding. “I'm sorry.”

Dean shakes his head. “It happens.”

“You were looking forward to seeing him,” Cas continues to push, clearly not hearing the evasion in Dean's tone, or at least not caring for it.

“Just—leave it, Cas. It's okay, I'll get over it,” he sighs, and waves to Jo who is cleaning glasses over in the corner next to her mother.

Ellen's daughter, Jo is around Sam's age, meaning Dean grew up playing pirates and shipwrecks with her almost as much as his own brother. He turns back to Cas and puts on his best effacing grin. “Plus, now I get to see you. Not all bad, right?”

Cas raises an eyebrow. “Are you implying I'm your consolation prize?”

Dean licks his lips as his grin takes on a leering quality, and his gaze strays to Cas' mouth. Cas has one of those mouths that always looks like it's _begging_ to be kissed, for all it's left open just so, in that perfect 'o'. “You're the jackpot of a whole different game entirely, man,” Dean chuckles.

He sends off a quick text to his mom that he's staying out with Cas instead and not to worry that he's not coming back as soon as he'd said (he's a grown ass man, but his mother is still his mother), and flags down Ellen for a drink when he's able to catch her eye again.

“Winchester,” she greets him with, grabbing an empty glass to place it below the tap. As she begins pouring him his usual beer, she asks without looking up, “Where's the other Winchester?”

“Still playing _Law & Order_ in the city. Or, at least the lawyer part.”

“And look at that, you got the cop part right here,” Ellen laughs, nodding up at Castiel beside him. “Your life is a prime time show.”

“Award-winning?” Dean banters back.

“Yeah, for biggest pain in my ass.”

Dean gasps, mock wounded. “What, did I usurp Bobby?”

“Right now you are, boy,” she laughs again, and goes to pour a pint for another regular Dean can see just sat down a few seats down the bar from them.

Dean turns to notice Cas staring at him. Which, to be fair, is not that unusual, because Cas in general seems to do a _lot_ of staring, but he's looking at Dean now with almost a sense of _longing_ in his eye, and that throws Dean for a moment.

“What?” he asks, now incredibly self-conscious, which is saying something, as Cas kind of always makes Dean feel self-conscious nowadays.

“Nothing,” Castiel shakes his head, picking up his own drink, half empty already, and taking a sip.

“Ellen secretly loves me, don't worry,” Dean says, if he was worrying about their friendly jibing.

“Oh, no, I would never think it. I was merely thinking how familiar you are with her, here. Comfortable,” he notes.

“Yeah, well, I've known Ellen forever. Jo too, since she was born. Dad was pretty close with her husband before _he_ passed, and Bobby 's known all of them.” Dean's never really known his _actual_ extended family—his dad long divorced from his own past, and Dean's grandparents on Mary's side, he knows, both died before either he or Sam were born—but the Harvelles and Bobby both have more than made up for it in Dean's life. He can't remember a time they weren't there for him, or the rest of the Winchester clan.

“They are your family, too, then in a sense.”

“Yeah, I guess they are,” Dean agrees, and the idea makes his heart swell. It makes his heart swell even more to know that Cas has _noticed._

“What about you? You got any family?” he then asks, now incredibly curious, as Cas seems to be very fixated on the point of family tonight.

Cas' mouth forms a tight, sour line as he swallows another sip of his beer. Dean thinks it's not because he doesn't like the taste of it. “I do, though I've not seen them for quite some time.” Touchy subject then, Dean silently notes.

“Where are you from, anyway?” Dean can't resist asking. “I don't think you ever said.”

“Some place far away and very close,” Cas answers enigmatically.

“Wow, you really ace that tall, dark, and mysterious thing don't you,” Dean comments, amused and not a little bit turned on by it. Dean acutally doesn't usually go for the reserved and difficult type, but he's been trying all kinds of new things lately, apparently.

“So, no sisters, brothers?” he asks. Cas knows so much about his family—frighteningly so, almost, for someone he's just met—that Dean feels awkward knowing so little about his.

“I have several of both,” Cas says, but elaborates no further. “But again, I've not been able to see them for a long while.”

That doesn't sound too cheery. “Are you... fallen out with them?” Dean asks carefully.

Cas considers this for a second, before replying grimly, “Yes, I suppose I am.”

Dean grimaces in sympathy. “I'm sorry, man, that sucks.”

“It is what it is. I've made my choices, I will learn to live with them,” he concludes, frowning into his now empty glass.

For all that Cas seems often out of place, so new and unused to this place and these people, he fits in spectacularly right now, right here, Dean thinks. Just another guy mourning his troubles in a darkened bar.

But when he turns to Dean his face is void of regrets. “At any rate, if my life had not lead me here, then I would not have met you.”

Now _that's_ a heavy statement. It sends Dean's heart pounding. “Now Iknow _I'm_ a poor consolation prize,” he jokes, his face heating up. He'd be hard pressed to call himself _any_ sort of prize, really.

“You're the jackpot for a whole different game entirely,” Cas echoes his earlier line back at him. It breaks the tension perfectly. Dean laughs.

“Hey, you can't use my lines on me! That's cheating.”

Castiel cocks his head, face impassive and the picture of innocence. Dean suspects it's all façade, but he's not one to bet, not on something as grave as this. Not with someone like him, who despite every reason to the contrary not only _likes_ Dean but wants to _know_ him.

“Cheating at what?”

“Um, you know,” Dean shrugs, self-conscious again. “Flirting.”

Cas tilts his head further ever slightly in silent question. “Are we flirting?” he inquires very seriously, as if the answer changes everything. Maybe it does. Then again, Dean can't really tell is this is in and of itself Cas' way of flirting _back_.

“God, you either you're deceptively good at this or really just _that innocent,_ ” he laughs, and he thinks he can see the ghost of a smile on Cas' lips. “Somehow I'm starting to doubt the latter was ever true.”

“I have never flirted before,” Cas admits.

“Really?” Dean gapes. “Handsome face like you? You can't tell me _no one's_ ever asked you out before.”

“I never said I've not been flirted _with_. I just have never felt the impulse to return it.”

Well that's a bit more reasonable. Feeling brave, he asks, “What about me then?”

“You're different,” Cas says simply, and leaves it at that. Now, Dean knows it's not just the effects of alcohol in his veins—his tolerance isn't that low anyway—as a warm, buzzing, happy feeling washes through him.

 

 

***

 

 

When he gets home, after a few more rounds and even more flirtatious overtures spurred on by the liquid courage, he opens the front door as quietly as possible, trying not to disturb the house. He paces down the hallway, shucking his coat, and steps into the kitchen for a late night snack.

He halts in surprise, however, when the turns into the doorway and spots his mother awake long past the hour that she normally reitres, seated at the kitchen table and nursing a mug of tea.

“How’d your date go?” his mom asks, smile peeking at the side of her lips.

“It wasn’t—” Dean starts and stops, incredibly flustered. “It wasn’t a _date_ , it was just drinks. With a dude. With a dude who’s my _friend_ , that’s normal.”

Mary's teasing eyes grow softer. “Dates are pretty normal too.”

Dean shuffles across the kitchen to get his own cup from the cupboard, filling it with water in the sink. “Not with Cas,” he says, looking down.

“Why not with Cas?” His mother can be pretty relentless.

Dean sets his cup down in the middle of the draining sink and leans against the counter, bowing his head as he closes his eyes. This is all too much, all this vulnerability in front of everybody tonight. “Mom, I—”

A chair scrapes across the floor and his mother stands up beside him. She puts a hand on his shoulder. “Dean, baby, you know you can talk to me, right?”

He lets out a shuddering breath, eyes still shut tight. His mother's hand is warm, though, on his back, and he leans into it as he straightens up. “I know.”

Mary's voice is gentle in his ear. “And you know you deserve someone who makes you happy.”

“Do I, though?” he asks quietly, turning around to face her as a salty, sour feeling starts building in the back of his throat.

Mary takes he son's face between the hands, grip light but gaze firm. “Of course you do, of _course_. You are a warm and welcoming, smart and compassionate man, Dean, with everything to give. More than your father, even, and he was a good man, too. Didn't he deserve my love?”

“That's different,” Dean protests.

“How is it different?”

“Cas isn't _in love_ with me,” Dean stresses. In what world could that be possible, even months, years in the future? The more Cas is gonna get to know him, the less he's gonna like Dean, that's for sure. Dean just wants to hold onto this friendship while it lasts, because it's finite he knows, like everything.

Mary sighs empathetically, and drops her arms again. “Maybe not now, but what if he was?” The accompanying question of _'Would he let himself be, too?'_ Lingers in the air around them.

Dean shakes his head. The event is so preposterous it's hardly worth considering. “It's a moot point, mom,” he sighs, dragging a hand over his face. “We're just friends.”

His mother moves to pick up her forgotten mug of tea, now empty, and places it next to Dean's. She's dropping the topic now, Dean can tell, but not before she holds his gaze and gives him one last piece of advice: “Even so, friends can love each other just as much.”

 

 

***

 

Dean wakes up the next morning with his brain slightly foggy still from the night before, with a small buzzing in his temples telling him he _really_ should have had another glass of water before bed. He wasn't even really _drunk_ last night, but clearly he's dehydrated enough to warrant popping some Advil first thing before coffee.

Despite the budding headache, however, he doesn't feel as _heavy_ getting out of bed as he has in recent months—in recent years, really. He strangely feels _good_.

Stopping off in the bathroom across the hall first for a bit of morning relief and some of that merciful Advil for good measure, Dean completes his whole morning routine before he remembers a promise he had made to Cas last night, to come by and fix up some stuff around his house.

“Oh shit, I should call him,” Dean mutters to himself, and then has a desperate moment where he forgets if he ever got the guy's phone number or not.

Taking out his cell, he flicks through the contact list for Cas' name or any other cryptic entry (it's happened before that people have ended up in his phone with drunkenly coined nicknames), and lets out a sigh of relief when he finds “Castiel Milton” listed right where it ought to be. Either Dean had been very sure to remember Cas' number right, or Cas had written it in himself. Both prospects make Dean smile down at his phone. God, he's _way_ too smitten.

He presses call and tries not to pace while it rings. Just as Dean thinks he's only going to catch Cas' voicemail, the line crackles with a sparse but sultry, “Hello, Dean”.

Dean starts for a second before he remembers that caller ID is a thing that exists in this wild modern world of theirs, and then offers his own “Hey, Cas,” in return.

The responding silence after their initial hellos makes Dean remember that it was _he_ who called _him_. Oops.

“So, uh, I know I said yesterday I'd come by and help you up clean up your place with you. I was just thinking, I'm free today, so... I don't know if that works for you?” Apparently Dean is an expert at awkward phone calls.

“Oh, um, yes,” Castiel says, and Dean can here some shuffling going on in the background. Excellent, apparently Cas is and awkwardness expert extraordinaire, too. They make an _awesome_ pair.

“Forgive me, I'm a bit disorganised this morning,” he explains of the the shuffling. “As I often am on my days off,” he adds, sighing at himself. “I am decidedly not a 'morning person,' I've discovered, and so if I have the chance to sleep in I try to make the most of my laziness.” Dean can literally _hear_ Cas' use of air quotes around the words “morning person,” and he's half-certain Cas probably adorably mimed them out.

“You should get some coffee man,” Dean chuckles, though kind of relishing the slow drag of Cas' sleepy voice as he struggles to rally himself for the day.

“Believe me, that is _always_ a first priority. I've acquired quite the taste for it these past few years. It's a marvel of human invention.”

“So I take it you like coffee then.” Understatement is always a good opener, in Dean's experience.

“In the same way fish like water, I suppose, yes,” Castiel deadpans.

“Maybe I'll bring some over,” Dean offers, before pausing again, second guessing. “Are you... cool with that? If you want to take the whole day for yourself that's fine, I just thought—”

“No, yes of course. Come at your convenience. I will try to look presentable,” Cas adds wryly.

“Aw, Cas, you're always a sight for sore eyes,” Dean flirts lightly, wondering if Cas will even remember this later, in his post-caffeine state.

“You might need to get your vision checked,” Castiel denies very sombrely, but Dean thinks he might be playing a long just a bit. His chest swells with a light, airy feeling of accomplishment.

“So, uh, yeah see you in a bit?” he coughs, before he gets ahead of himself.

“Mmm,” Castiel mumbles, and Dean gladly takes that as Cas' morning version of assent.

 

 

***

 

 

“Nice peach fuzz,” Dean says when he arrives on Cas' creaky doorstep, and Cas opens the door clearly having not yet shaved (though, to be fair, Dean sort of suspects Cas doesn't really like shaving at _all,_ for all that he seems to be perpetually stubble ridden). Without thinking, he raises a hand to stroke his cheek with the back of a finger, on an impulse to feel the fuzz against his skin.

Castiel is not fazed at all when Dean jerks his hand back, and doesn't even blink. “Thank you.”

Dean coughs as he steps around Cas to get inside. “So, uh, anything specific you want to tackle first? I brought some tools down if you need any repair work done. Could start with that front door that looks like it's gonna fall of its hinges sometime soon.”

“Considering I honestly haven't thought much about what to do about _any_ of this, I'm happy to defer to your expertise.”

Dean can see Castiel wasn't joking. As he steps into the hallway, he can see the living room is still pretty much exactly as he last saw it, barely even _half_ unpacked. Dean wouldn't be surprised if anything that needed more concerted effort of repair had also been neglected in these many weeks since Castiel's arrival.

“Your parents never showed you around a basic tool kit, even?”

“No,” Cas says stiffly. “I _am_ adept enough to figure out the use and function,” he continues, adamant that his skill not be undervalued. “I've simply never had occasion to engage in any... practical application.”

“That's a long winded way of saying you're totally lost, dude,” Dean laughs at his expense.

Castiel makes a sour face. Apparently he's allowed to admit to this particular weakness but Dean's not allowed to comment on it. “I'm indifferent,” he tries to correct, to Dean's enduring and endless amusement.

“Mhmm,” Dean raises his brow with a smirk, and Castiel's frown only grows darker.

 

 

***

 

 

He starts with the front door and step, because he doesn't like the feeling that it could collapse on his at any moment, or indeed Cas, when half-asleep and going off for work early in the morning.

He'd brought some replacement hinges with him, and hopes that'll do the trick.

It doesn't take too long, for he's done this sort of thing before, and by the time Cas has cleaned up and made himself another large cup of coffee (which might be an impressive feat if it weren't now the _afternoon_ —although Dean guesses with his job, you have to milk a day off for everything you can), he's fixed and satisfied with both.

“Finished up here,” he says, wiping his brow of sweat. “Is there anything else outside that needs fixing up? Looks like it's gonna storm soon so might as well get to it now.” He squints up into the darkening sky behind them. He'd noticed the encroaching clouds on his drive up, but even in the few hours since he first left his own home, the sky has darkened considerably.

Castiel frowns, at a loss. “I don't know.”

“How about your shed?” Which, really, if you asked Dean, was more of a _barn_ for how big it was. He only got that one short glance of it on his first day here when he'd met Cas, but even from a distance you could tell it was a considerable space, though a bit... decrepit, with neglect.“Ever done any exploring around in it?”

“No, I left that to Ben when I moved in.”

“Jesus, you're hopeless,” Dean says, but it's no real accusation. He's horribly endeared, if anything. God, is he _easy._ “Is that what you do as deputy, get Jody to do everything for you?”

“Rather the opposite, if she feels like it. Which she often does,” Castiel admits, though his tone remains fond. “She is very good at bossing people around.”

“So you'll do _metaphorical_ dirty work but not real dirty work.”

Castiel seems to seriously contemplate his answer, but when he finally does speak Dean has a hard time believing he's being anything but knowingly deadpan about it. “It depends how dirty,” he says, and Dean's mind can't be blamed for going all _kinds_ of places when Cas' voice rolls over that last word.

 _Dirty._ Yeah, Dean really can't help what his imagination does with that.

 

 

***

 

 

The trek out to the shed isn't that much of a hike (though Cas' property is big enough that Dean suspects the building _did_ function as a barn at some point), but it still takes them twice as long to make it, for all their slow pace and gentle flirting that Dean has hopelessly given up on denying that that's exactly what it is.

Flirting with Cas somehow feels like a challenge, and maybe because he can never _quite_ always tell if Cas is flirting back. But he's gotten better and better at reading Cas' tells for when he's joking or being truly serious with longer acquaintance, the bar last night certainly being a leg up in that regard, and at any rate, he kind of delights in the mystery of it. Every conversation with Cas, even the almost unbearably frustrating ones, are something _new_. They make him feel alight— _alive_.

Like this afternoon, how he finds himself in Cas' overgrown yard, full of the yellowing grass of fall, and he strangely feels at home in these foreign fields. Cas is an enigma at his shoulder, but a welcome one, and as the skies grey, harkening coming rain, it doesn't fill him with dread as such weather and the memories it brings usually would. Today, he'll make a new memory, of Cas' half smile glimpsed through his stupid hair as it twirls in the breeze. The weight of his tool box in his hand is the lightest it's ever been.

They reach the doors of the shed just as the sun falls behind the darkening curtain of clouds for probably the last time that day. Its doors are just as peeling and weathered as the house itself, but with less constant use it somehow looks more sad like this. Dean pulls on the handle of the double doors gently so as not to risk ripping them off their hinges, and then coughs into the dust that blows out at him.

The inside is dark (understandably) without any discernible light source to speak of (if there was, Dean doubt it would work at this point in the building’s decay), but it's mercifully not as gross and damp as Dean had expected. The air is musky to be sure, but it's dry and slightly cool, and the smell reminds Dean of rifling through Bobby's attic with Sam when he was young.

Still, despite only the open door to light their way inside, Dean can see the space is not nearly as decrepit as he imagine it. It looks untouched, so Ben certainly hadn't been in here organising it (an ridiculous notion, Dean thinks—he'd be way more liable to light the place on fire on accident), but clearly whoever had assembled the stuff together in here had envisioned some kind of order to it, long ago.

To one corner, on Dean's left, closest to the door, sits a collection of old, wooden chairs that look like they've seen happier days. At the back, as far as Dean can see clearly, sits an small, rusted tractor that probably hasn't been used in decades upon decades. There are stacks of garden supplies—buckets, shovels, ladders, etc.—and there's a whole shelf of foggy glass jars with bits like nails and screws inside them. Once upon a time this place might have operated something like Dean's own workshop.

But there is also even stranger stuff, as clearly what was once an old work shed had since been more recently converted into a storage one. On Cas' right there are two mismatched table lamps, their lampshades hanging slightly off-kilter. One sits on top of a broken television set that has to be from either the 50s or 60s, by own downright antique it looks. Casting his eye above as he steps into the clearest space in the middle, Dean also notices several pairs of old skis perched among the rafters.

“Why the fuck are there _skis_ in here?” he asks, surprised. Not that people owning skis is _unheard_ of (though they are far away from anywhere they'd by of any use—Vermont's close but it's not _that_ close, and certainly not for anyone of such poor farmland as this), but he faintly remembers from his childhood that the last people who lived here were fairly reclusive folk. He can't imagine them jetting off for an alpine holiday at a resort full of tourists far more annoying, Dean would think, than the kind they get around here during the season anyway.

Castiel steps up beside him, angling his neck in turn. “Anything in here would belong to the previous owners,” he supplies. Dean had never expected the skis to have belonged to him, but something about the image of Cas wearing them makes him chuckle to himself.

He walks over to the trashed TV set and picks up the lamp on top of it to inspect it. “Jesus, they must have just kept everything they didn't want anymore in here,” he comments as he sets it down again.

“Hence probably why I was not charged extra for any of it,” Castiel muses.

Dean abandons the curio corner for the one with the wooden chairs, crouching down next to them to asses their sturdiness as he sets his toolbox down. “Hey, these chairs are definitely salvageable!” he throws over his shoulder to Cas. He grazes a hand over one of the dusty seats. “I mean, they need some sanding and some fortifying work maybe, but they'll be nice when they're finished. You could use some chairs, right?”

Cas at least does have the good sense to _look_ embarrassed when he says, as Dean straightens up again, “At the moment I only have the one for the desk in the living room.

“You have a desk and chair in your living room?” Dean's doesn't remember anything other than the ratty, pathetic old couch. And boxes. Endless boxes.

Castiel also has the good grace to wince. “Under several stacks of books, yes.”

Well, that would explain it. It also reminds Dean of a question that's been sitting in the back of his ind ever since the first day he met Cas. “How do you have so many books anyway?”

Confusion knits Cas' brow. “Because I purchased or otherwise acquired them?”

“No,” Dean laughs. _Of course_ he would take that literally. “I mean, for a guy who doesn't seem to think much of material possession, why... books?”

“I like to read,” Castiel explains blandly, with that small shrugging motion of his that's really more of a jerk of the shoulder, as if the action was a practiced one.

“Yeah, no kidding, Captain Obvious. But I mean, you _could_ get internet out here...” Dean trails off. Not that the internet is a reason to forgo anything physically paper-bound, but for someone's who's material existence seems to thrive on impermanence, a laptop seems like it would make more sense for Cas. It would at least be portable, where boxes upon boxes of books were decidedly not.

“I can use the internet at the office,” Castiel points out. What a belligerent asshole, Dean thinks, wholly enamoured by it.

He smiles, unoffended. “You're just not going to answer my question are you.” It's not really a question.

“No, I—“ Castiel huffs, unhappy with being accused of being purposefully troublesome. “I read because I like to learn. It's a simple and modest answer. At first, it was because I was searching for something.”

 _That_ piques Dean's interest, and not just for the hot professor imagery. “Research?”

“Of a sort, yes,” Castiel nods. “But then it became a passion in and of itself, not a means to an end. There is a lot to this world that I do not know. And I'd like to find out.”

It's Dean's turn to be cheeky. “For all of the world you're gonna need more books than that.”

“Perhaps you can work on converting this barn into a library then.”

Dean laughs. “That would be a task,” he says as he kicks up dust around them to pace in what little clear space there is. He stops when he hears nothing more from Cas. “You _are_ joking right?”

Cas is silent and stoic for a good few seconds before his expression cracks and he smiles back. “Yes, although it's not a bad idea.”

“No, it isn't,” Dean agrees, envisioning for a moment Cas reclined in a gilded room, towering with books on all sides. He'd be at home there, he thinks. He glances back at the chairs. “First you should work on getting some real furniture though.”

Any reply to that Castiel would have made, however, is drowned out by a loud boom from outside, closely followed by a bright flash. Clunks start sounding off the roof, slowly at first, but their patters increase in speed within seconds.

Dean opens the shed door wider from where it had gradually begun to swing closed of its own accord, peering out into the sheets of raining now falling from the sky. “Shit, is it raining already?”

Cas comes up behind him, a solid presence at Dean's back, and Dean has to actively suppress a shiver that desperately wants to run down his spine. “It would seem like it,” he states the obvious.

Dean clears his throat, but his voice remains slightly shaky when he says, “Another day then?” thinking back to his earlier promise to clean up some of the chairs to bring inside the main house.

He imagines Cas nods behind him, though he doesn't turn to look. “It will have to be,” he agrees, and curls a his left hand around the splintery edge of the old door and throws it open, about to step into the rain.

“Whoa!” Dean jumps, placing his hand on Cas to stop him from taking off. His skin is cool and dry beneath Dean's burning palms. “You're not gonna just try to wait it out?” he asks, wary of getting soaked if they bee-line it back now.

Cas squints out into the drenched landscape, eyeing his house across the field. “Knowing this area this rain will continue long into the evening.” He turns back to Dean. “I'm not going to stay in a badly lit barn with no food forever.”

As much as food sounds like a heavenly prospect right now, he's still not looking forward to spending hours drying off. It's not like he can exactly strip and change clothes in front of Cas (however much his midnight fantasies have said otherwise). “Yeah, but—” he starts to protest weakly one last time, but is cut off by Cas' assessing stare, delivered with the characteristic tilt of his head.

“Are you afraid of the rain, Dean?” he asks, and it's not unduly prying—his friend's eyes are merely curious—but it somehow cuts Dean to his core. Why would Cas ask him _that?_ Does he _know?_

“No,” Dean gulps out, but it's not entirely convincing. It's not that he's afraid of the rain exactly—that'd be like being afraid of _air_ around here—but that he doesn't exactly relish the thought of perpetual wetness, of water the pierces him down to his bones and dilutes his blood in a way that reminds him of drowning. He's not afraid of the rain; he's afraid of his own memory.

“I do have towels inside,” Cas offers as a compromise, pulling Dean out of his thoughts.

“Oh, the one thing you _do_ own?” he jokes back as a distraction.

Cas' face is very stern and solemn when he replies, “Even _I_ take showers.”

“You just neglect to shave fully,” Dean ribs gently, glancing at Cas' bearded chin again. His fingers twitch at the memory of where they'd touched earlier, itching to cup his face and feel the prickling of his hair against his palm. It's a safer subject to dwell on, at least, than Cas naked in a shower.

The corner of Castiel's mouth quirks up in his favourite version of a smirk. “You were very enamoured with my stubble earlier.”

Dean shrugs. “What can I say, I'm a simple man with simple tastes.”

Cas raises an eyebrow as his shoulders tighten, gearing up for the onslaught of rain. “Shall we run for it then?”

“' _Shall we'?_ Oh you definitely read too many old books,” Dean laughs, pushing past Cas to step outside first, starting into a light jog.

“'Shall' is a perfectly legitimate and contemporary word!” he hears Castiel yell behind him, just before another clap of thunder shudders through the sky.

“Yeah, I just wanted a head start!” Dean yells back, trying his best not to swallow a mouthful of rain water. “Race you!”

He picks up his pace after that, peeling it through the wet grass and squishing through the mud.

He almost trips in his surprise when Cas catches up to him, wet fringe flattened against his forehead and shirt sticking tight to his torso. As generally lither compared to himself as Dean assumed Cas to be, he can plainly see Cas is still packing some taught muscle, which he promptly uses to beat Dean to the house.

Cas holds the back door open for him as Dean climbs up the steps, careful not to slip. His own shirt is heavy on his skin, soaked through. His jeans are mercifully drier, but the soggy yard has turned his boots into mini marshes that he's desperate to get off.

The rain is still coming fast and heavy when they finally get into the house, dripping all over the floor. Castiel closes the door behind him, sealing the storm out, and then walks down the hall to the staircase before climbing it with quick strides. Dean toes off his boots while he waits for Cas to return, and moments later he does, coming back down with a stack of towels.

He throws a towel at Dean. “You're faster than you look,” Dean says as he catches the towel and his breath at the same time.

Castiel takes off his own shoes with a towel draped around is shoulders, the other extra he'd brought down now hooked over the banister of the stairs. Shoes off, he straitens up, and drags the towel across his head. “Looks are deceiving,” he says when he drops the towel around his neck again, his normally dishevelled hair now standing even more ludicrously on end. ”You of all people should know this,” he adds, which throws Dean and makes him raise his hackles.

“What's that supposed to mean?” he demands a little too snappishly.

“It means that you are more than just a 'simple man' Dean, no matter what kind of façade to the contrary you like to project.”

Dean chuckles mirthlessly. “And how would you know?” He tries not to sound bitter, but it is a bitter sentiment of which he speaks, hardened in his veins after years of self-doubt. It's not that _he_ doesn't know he hides things beneath the surface—he just knows no one who uncovered it would like what they found. The idea that Cas might ever is enough to terrify him into defensiveness.

“Because I've seen you,” Cas says, eyes boring into Dean's as if his soul was laid bare to him. Dean swallows hard, adjusting his stance, shifting his weight from foot to foot in nervous habit. Flight or flight, right? He's ready for either.

First, though, he tries for evasive manoeuvres. “Look man, I don't know what it is you think you've seen—”

“ _Dean,_ ” Castiel interrupts sternly. He approaches cautiously, throwing his towel aside to fall into a lump on the floor. Dean blinks blankly at it for a second before his eyes return to Castiel's adamant ones.

“I've seen how kind you are, how clever,” he continues, slowly, as if to make sure his words become ingrained in Dean's very bones. His body almost vibrates with the force of it. “How you are unbelievably hard-working and eager to make everyone around you happy, even at the expense of yourself. I've seen that you clearly want so many things, but don't know if you're deserving enough to reach for them. Those are not simple problems, Dean.“

Standing before him, mere inches away from the tip of his nose, Dean wonders what else Castiel has seen. If he knows all this, does he suspect how dangerously Dean is allured to him?

“But perhaps they come with simple answers,” he says, so matter of factually, brow serious and tone deep that Dean imagines the only way to escape this assessing gaze would be to kiss him. He licks his lips as he holds onto that thought. His own gaze flicks down to Cas mouth, whose lips are full and just a bit cracked looking, ready to be wet.

Dean clears his throat. His tongue feels heavy. “Yeah? And what's that?”

“That you _are_ deserving,” Cas concludes, and the electricity between them spikes.

Cas' eyes fall to watch Dean lick his lips again, and the charged, voyeuristic overtone of it gives Dean a spike of confidence to ask, “Of what?”, his heart thrumming hard in his chest.

Castiel's replying voice sounds like it's been raked over gravel more than usual, low and now clearly aroused, which of course only serves to make Dean more aroused _himself_. Maybe his heart won't be the only thing thrumming hard soon, he muses lewdly to himself.

“What do you want, Dean?” he asks back, and for a second Dean is too shocked to reply, a million thoughts running through his head at once.

Oh god, is there even any one answer? _I want my mother to be happy. I want my brother to visit more often. I want my family back together so I don't feel like I'm always breaking it apart._ But thinks none of these are things Cas should have hear, and the conversation already started too heavy for Dean's liking.

He settles on his next most pressing matter. “I want to kiss you,” he says instead, swaying into Cas' space like a moth towards a porch light. He wonders if he takes a taste of Cas' lips, will it burn him just as much to the touch?

It's a risk he's willing to take.

Cas meets him halfway. His face is cold when Dean cups it, a bit clammy from the rain, but his lips are warm, so soft and inviting as they open to him, and Dean can't tell if this feels like falling or flying, or perhaps better yet nothing he's ever known. All he knows is the taste of Cas' mouth and quickly Cas' fingers in his hair. He thinks he hears himself groan when they first thread through it, still wet from the rain. Those delicate, dangerous, cutting hands, cutting through Dean so deep with all those tender touches that he thinks it's a miracle Cas hasn't yet recoiled at what he's found, down in that darkness. He wishes the rain could have washed it all away.

The ever-present stubble along Cas' jaw scratches his chin as he rubs against it, and it's an exhilarating and distracting feeling from the mire of his thoughts. He knows he'll be able to touch the redness it will leave later and remember this moment with perfect clarity. He'll be able to remember the surprised sounds Cas makes now as if this is the first time he's ever been kissed, curious and galvanised to explore more.

Days later Dean will still remember the way Cas held onto his shoulder tighter as he pushed into his mouth, and breathed into him something like life itself.

After a few minutes, Dean has to force himself to step back and let his lungs have some relief.

“Sorry if that's not the answer you expected,” he tries to joke lightly, but his voice comes out raspy and wrecked.

The hand still on Dean's shoulder moves it's way up to Dean's cheek, and he leans into it. Cas' palms are warm, too, emanating comfort. Cas' thumb moves to stroke his bottom lip, mesmerised.

“It wasn't,” he says, rough voice run over miles more of rocky roads, eyes tracing the movement of his hand before he flicks his gaze back up to meet Dean's. “But it was welcome all the same.”

Dean casts his gaze around them, suddenly realising where they're standing, awkwardly in the hall at the entrance to the living room. He steps into the room slowly as he continues to catch his breath. Hopefully he'll reach the couch before they start making out again and both of their legs give out.

“I hope we didn't scandalise your books or anything.”

Cas follows, frowning in due consideration. “Oh, I have some very scandalous books, I'm sure they'll be fine,” he consoles, smiling wryly—a smile Dean notices with his own share of amusement, unable to keep his eyes off Cas' mouth for long. A mouth he just _kissed_.

Holy shit.

“Oh yeah, like what?” Dean's eyes dance, and he licks his lips again (a habit he's always had, although rarely expressed with such fervour).

Castiel raises an eyebrow. “Tales of ravishment and rakishness,” he tells him, taking Dean's hand as he does so, and pulling him back against him. Who know Cas had such seductiveness in him?

“They good?” Dean smiles into Cas' mouth. He's always loved kissing for its own sake, separate from sex. Loved the give and take of soft lips and hard teeth and tongues that moved in unspoken languages, in a conversation that never had to end. But _fuck_ did Cas' unleashed hunger for Dean's lips send all thoughts of chastity further than Dean could ever reasonably reach again.

“Mmhmm, some,” Cas hums, full ability to reply swallowed up by Dean's eager exploration of his mouth. He pauses, mournfully pulling his mouth with a pop. “But I think I'd like write my own.” His tone is somewhat flat, distracted, but it sounds suggestive, and Dean guesses it was meant to.

Dean pulls back about an inch in turn to look at Cas in the eye, amused at his use of such a line. “Is that your idea of seduction?”

“No,” he says after a blank beat, continuing, “I don't think any further seduction will be needed, I feel throughly seduced already,” and what music to Dean's ears it is.

“Good,” Dean grins, pulling Cas back towards him, finding his lips again and tasting joy on his tongue. He sighs into his mouth, relieved, rediscovered.

“Good.”

 

 

***

 

 

They stumble gracelessly to the horribly ugly couch, knocking themselves down in their fervour more than _sitting_ on it. They end up sprawled somewhat awkwardly, Dean's neck perched against the stiff armrest as he lies back to accommodate Cas kneeling over him. His neck and back muscles will end up hating him in the morning, but right now, he can't bring himself to care.

Cas hovers tentatively above him for a moment, before Dean rolls his eyes and pulls him down by a hand around the back of his neck.

They kiss clumsily, but Dean certainly doesn't care; he can't imagine Cas minds much either. The slow burn in the pit of his stomach, a coiling flame sending sparks through his limbs down to his fingertips, is a feeling he wishes he could live with forever. Cas' mouth on him quickly becomes an addictive sensation, something he's sure in that moment he can never live without again. The rasp of his stubble, of his croaking voice, getting ever rougher the more wrecked and ruffled they become, all coalesces into a climb that he doesn't even care if it doesn't end with a climax. Oh, he will try, eventually, if the hardness already straining against Dean's jeans has anything to say about it, but even just reaching the plateau of perfect foreplay is enough for him right now.

“This is,” Cas speaks in between nips exploring behind Dean's ear, “very good indeed.”

“Mmm,” Dean moans gracelessly. “Yeah, I'm delectable, you're delicious.”

“I never imagined it would be like this.”

It takes a few seconds for Dean's mind to process what Cas just said, but when he does he freezes. “Wait,” he tells him, trying to sit up. When Castiel doesn't seem to hear him, he pushes him off by the shoulder. “Cas, wait.”

Cas huffs, put out that Dean's stopped so abruptly when he'd been more than enthusiastic moments before. “What?”

“Is this your _first time?_ ” Dean asks. He'd only been slightly joking when he imagined Cas had never kissed anyone before—how could anyone ever deny that mouth? But it also kind of sounds like he's never done _any_ of this.

Cas' face scrunches in confusion, as if that was the last thing he expected Dean to follow up on after such a confession. “Kissing?” He pauses again, mulling over the concept. “Yes, I hope my inexperience is not hindering your enjoyment.” He looks slightly apologetic, which Dean feels the need to remedy quick. He's not annoyed, just _surprised._

“What? Jesus, I was talking about sex. No, no, just—You're what, 30, 35?” Dean guesses reasonably—Cas looks a bit older than him, but not by much—and the realises he doesn't actually know at all. That's a question for later, though, as he becomes suddenly affronted on behalf of Cas' past potential rejection. “How have you never kissed anyone? How have _you_ never _been_ kissed?”

Cas half-shrugs. “I've never had the inclination,” he explains simply. Fair enough.

The thought is somewhat baffling to Dean, though, who's often sought comfort in the heat of another body, in a friend's generosity like this. He can't imagine never craving the cushion of another's lips, the release that could come afterward, that brief moment where everything else in the world recedes and for a moment all you know is ecstatic bliss.

Then again, Dean really shouldn't be one to judge.

Whatever Cas' reasons though, another thought occurs to Dean, because clearly something’s _changed_ for Cas. He never used to care before, but now, very clearly he _does._

Dean ignores the more profound implications of that, and smirks instead. “So I'm just special.”

“You're _different_.”

“Irresistible,” Dean bargains further for, leaning back in for a kiss.

Castiel assents, opening himself up wide to receive him. “Yes,” Cas agrees, and the sound vibrates all the way down Dean's spine.

“You're pretty irresistible, too,” he offers in return, pulling away again to speak, and wonders briefly if he's ever said anything more _true_ in his life. Cas is annoying and an enigma, frustrating though charming in a curious sort of way, and most importantly: _irresistible._

“I'm glad to hear it. Can we continue with kissing now?” Cas requests, so perfectly primly that Dean regrets ever having stopped. “Or do you want to get all of your compliments out of your system first?”

“Well,” he leans in, taking Cas' bottom lip between his to suck on it before moving around to kiss the corner of his mouth, his jaw, his ear lobe next. “I could tell you that you have the most ridiculously shaped mouth I've ever seen on anyone who's never put it to use before,” he whispers, before returning to capture his friend's attention with his gaze.

“I can't tell if that's a compliment or renewed bafflement at my inexperience,” Castiel squints, and Dean laughs, a deep sound from the bottom of his stomach, bubbling up through his throat.

“No, no, I'm saying you have a pretty mouth.”

“Oh,” Castiel blinks. “In that case: you have a pretty mouth as well.”

Dean will later deny ever blushing. He knows he has a mouth like a porn-star, as it's worked wonders for him on more than one occasion, and Cas has no idea what he's in for, _really,_ until Dean goes down on him. But still, it's one thing to know you have some nice attributes, but it's another thing entirely for the guy you've been crushing on for weeks to _praise_ you for it. His face is hot when he mumbles a “Thanks,” quiet and shy.

Cas' fingers stop in their mindless motions against Dean's skin. He tilts his head ever so, in silent curiosity. “You are fine with giving them,” he notes, “but you are uncomfortable being complimented yourself.”

Ever astute at the most importune times, that Cas. Dean shakes his head, self-effacingly looking at his hands, sitting now on Cas thighs, from where he is inelegantly half-straddling Dean's lap. “Never had much worth noticing about me.”

“On the contrary,” Castiel says softly, but tone firm. “You are unavoidable, a beacon for moths like me, fluttering in search of light.” He says it as if such weighted words are an everyday occurrence, commonplace to him.

Dean doesn't know what to say.

“Cas,” he chokes out, throat constricted and chest heavy. The light, flying feeling from making out earlier replaced by a desperate _burning,_ uncomfortable and tantalising all at once. Cas' faith in him is the most confusing thing about him, Dean thinks. It doesn't make any sense, and therefore _they_ shouldn't make any sense, but Dean wants _so badly_ to hold onto this searing feeling anyway.

“The more I come to know you Dean,” Cas shifts to a better, more balanced position on top of him, “the more in awe I become. But I will acquiesce to silence for now, if you wish.”

“Just shut up and kiss me,” Dean says, but he tries to make it sound like a _thank you_ , too. As uncomfortable as Cas can make him, he also does the exact opposite so easily, and under his hands, Dean wants to be picked apart and put back together. He wants to give Cas the same experience.

And Cas _does_ , kissing him obligingly with a renewed interest in the curves of Dean's face, the perfect lines of his neck. Cas touches Dean like he's some artwork, only uncovered by covering flesh with flesh. Dean arches into the sparks his fingers make beneath the surface of his skin.

Through the haze that is his brain hooked on the sensation of _Cas_ he realises they're wearing far too many clothes.

“Ghrhm,” he grumbles out first. Not quite the sound he wanted to make, but apparently one Cas enjoys, for all his response is to continue his ministrations with some choice groans of his own.

“Cas, man, too many clothes,” Dean tries for again. “Take of your shirt,” he says, not terribly smoothly, but it does the trick. Cas sits up high on his knees and swipes of his shirt with a commendable speed and finesse.

As he had thought, Cas isn't nearly as broad as Dean, nor as robust, but he's _far_ from skinny, muscles built in areas Dean imagines a swimmer's or a runner's would be, with gorgeously toned arms and a taught chest. His hips, though, his _hips_ —peeking out just above his waistline—are what catches Dean. They're _ridiculous_. Perfectly angled and sharp, but covered in smooth skin that Dean suddenly wants—no, _needs_ —to taste.

“Dean, ah— _Dean,_ ” Cas sighs out in breathless, clipped tones, as Dean licks his way down the pale remnants of a happy trail. Cas' fingers rake through Dean's hair, and Dean almost has to stop and lean against Cas' hip to stop from shuddering at the tenderness of the motion.

And then something in them shifts again.

Cas pushes Dean back with his other hand, and wordlessly implores him to remove his shirt as well by helping him do it. Throwing it over some pile of books in the background once that's taken care of, Dean moves his hands down to undo his belt before Cas' mouth on his nipple stops him, sending him actually _gasping_ into the dim, evening light.

Dean thought Cas _kissed_ well, but it turns out to be _nothing_ compared to what his tongue can do when applied to other regions of his body. He sucks on Dean's nipples, flicking them with the tip of this tongue in a way that leaves Dean's nerves feeling frayed and alight. What Cas lacks in experiences in sex, he makes up for it in his unrestrained interest in exploring every inch of Dean, in finding his all his spots.

He kisses down Dean's stomach, getting closer and closer to practically mouthing Dean's cock through his jeans, and Dean wants to lean back, close his eyes and get lost in this, but he also want to _see_ Cas—Cas, beautiful and alive above him, hair mussed and pupils blown.

“Fuck I'm gonna—” Dean groans, feeling something build in the pit of his stomach, his cock straining for release. “I think I'm gonna come just like this, Cas,” he breathes into this mouth raggedly, hips jerking into Cas' body. He wants to laugh, but his lungs feel winded.

He can feel the desperate hardness of Cas' length through his jeans, too, and the touch sends Dean reeling.

“I hope you have a washing machine,” Dean tries to joke, but it comes out sounding too ridiculously debauched for Cas to really pay attention to the words and not just the _sound_ of them, wrecked and wanting. His pupils, if possible, grow wider.

“That is one appliance I thankfully own,” he says very seriously, mouthing along Dean's neck. The rumbling tone of it makes the tiny hairs there stand on end, and Dean stretches into the warmth of it. God, he really _could_ come just like this, but he wants _more_ too. His mouth waters at just the _image_ of taking Cas' cock into his mouth, but he'll settle for just feeling the weight of it in his hand for now, he's too far gone already.

He manages to remove his hands from Cas' tempting hair to reach down between them, fumbling for Cas' belt first. One hand grazes the tip of Cas' erection in thtough pants, and the man above him stutters in his motions, moaning, _“Dean.”_

Dean chuckles, and the sound vibrates through both of them. “Easy there. Patience.”

“ _'Patience'_ is the most deplorable word I've ever heard,” Cas growls as Dean pops the button of Cas' fly.

“ _God_ , you and me both,” Dean breathes out heavily, kissing Cas' temple. “One sec,” he says, finally getting the zipper down and Cas' cock free out of his briefs, and _fuck,_ yeah, it's hard and big and everything Dean ever dreamed, and feels fucking _perfect_ in his palm. Precome is already leaking out of it, and Dean rubs a thumb along the head blindly, face still pressed into the side of Cas'.

Cas' movements are stuttered and shaky, overwhelmed by the experience. But still, his mouth is hungry, and as Dean begins to jerk him off in earnest his mouth re-finds Dean's, taking him in, putting all his sighs and moans into his kisses, salty, salivating tongue sliding against Dean's as his hips find their motion with the rhythm of Dean's hands.

“Yeah, that's it,” Dean whispers.

Cas comes quickly after, breath hitching first before he jerks forward one last time, and lets go.

 

 

***

 

 

“I'd apologise for ruining your couch, but I have to say, it's a pretty hideous couch, dude,” Dean says after, when they've moved into a more comfortable post-coital position, where Dean's neck _isn't_ being broken over the hard arm-rest of this deplorable excuse for a sofa. Cas is slouched into Dean's chest, who in turn has his feet propped up on a nearby unpacked box (with Cas' grudgingly given permission).

They're both sweaty and debauched looking, Dean's sure, but neither can really bring themselves to move and get changed. Good news is at least they're dry, now that their wet shirts are long forgotten, and hell, even if their pants _were_ sopping too, Dean wonders if he would really care. His legs fell gooey and happy, and a content buzzing encompasses his whole body. He could see him calling this ratty old house home and never moving ever.

“It _is_ very unfortunate looking,” Cas agrees.

Dean looks around the room, trying to see if he can spot the fabled desk Cas mentioned earlier. “You need new furniture.”

“I am not used to having much of it,” Cas says from somewhere below Dean's chin. “I'm terrible with choosing.”

This place would actually be really nice if it had the proper care put into it, Dean thinks, and Dean feels kind of bad now that his free day of handy work was cut so short by rain. He can always tackle those chairs another day, but a set of old dining chairs do not a furnished house make.

“I could—well, I could make you some,” he offers, trying to sound casual. It _is_ his job, but something about offering to make something for _Cas_ feels miles more intimate.

Cas seems to like the idea. He sits up, leaving a woefully cold rush of air to hit Dean in his chest in his absence, and looks at Dean contemplatively. “I could commission you? Lisa was telling me how you built her kitchen cabinets.”

“Well, yeah, but I mean, if payment's an obstacle for you we could work something out, I know you've only been on the job a couple months, and this place itself can't be quick to pay off.” Dean doesn't want to be the one responsible for making Cas broke just because he _likes_ the guy.

Cas is quick to assuage his fears. “I believe I have enough saved up.”

“Sweet, well, yeah.” Dean perks up, excited by the prospect to personalise something for him. “Come by the workshop any time, I can show you around it properly,” he says, remembering the sudden meeting Cas had once made there. “I can show you some samples of stuff I could build you.”

Cas tilts his head in thought. “What about that table?”

“Hmm?” Dean hums, distracted by the perfectly ridiculous combination of Cas' concentrating expression and his wild, sex-ruffled hair.

“The one you were building when I walked in on you the last time.”

Dean blinks. “Oh that's not—” _Really anything—_

“What?” Cas prompts, so earnest and sincere that Dean drops any idea of what he was going to say.

“Well, I was gonna say that's not for sale, but I have no real idea what to do with it when it's finished.” He'd been so obsessed with working on it he'd honestly never thought much about the object's future. His hand drifts to Cas' knee to show the genuineness of his offer. “It'd be cool if it'd go to someone who actually had use for it.”

Cas' eyes flick down to Dean's hand, and a small but warm smile peeks at the corner of his lips. “I have books in here that might be useful to you, too,” he says.

It's Dean's turn to cock his head in confusion. Man, already picking up habits. He's got it _bad_. “What do you mean?”

“Among other things, I have several books on human mythologies from across cultures and centuries,” Cas explains. “There are a fair few on marine myths, since I noticed a theme in your carvings.”

That Cas remembers that level of detail about his work sends a pleasant feeling zipping through him.

“You into mythology too?” Dean grins. “Man, how have you _not_ become best friends with Bobby?”

Of course, Bobby usually took a long while to warm up to new people; he might very well hate Cas at first. But good ol' Bobby was good friends with the Sheriff, and close to a father to Dean himself; he hopes Cas would get the benefit of the doubt. Once they both got passed their gruff and dry exteriors, Dean thinks they'd be liable to stay holed up in Bobby's house for days just swapping stories.

It sounds a lot like flirting when Cas says, “I thought I was best friends with you,” but it still touches Dean in a vulnerable spot.

“What, really?” he asks.

“Do you not consider us friends?”

Dean shakes his head. “No, I've just... never had a best friend before,” he finds himself admitting. Sammy had always been the person he hung around with most, but being his brother and kind of stuck with him for life, Dean supposed that didn't really count. “I dunno exactly what one is like.”

Cas' hand is hot when it's placed over Dean's, but maybe that's less to do with Cas' body temperature and more to do with the spark of _touch._

“Neither have I.”

 

 

***

 

 

Dean hasn't had a nightmare in weeks. Cas' hands are what haunt him now, in more delectable ways, teasing his hair in yellow-tinged dreams, trancing the angles of his jaw and mouthing at the jutting of his hips. His thighs still tremble when he wakes sometimes, hard and wanting, reaching for that warm, attentive touch. He wants Cas more than he can ever really remember wanting anyone, in the way that “wanting” means his blood burns with the simplest of smiles and his mind reaches to hang onto every word, whether recounting an event from the day or muttered in secret in the dark.

He wants Cas, too, because he wants to give this feeling _back_ to him, all this respite and reassurance that there is some beauty left to behold, that there is a home to be offered in his heart, if Cas'll take it. This notion terrifies him, of course, because he's only known Cas all of a few months, and yet he's ingrained himself beneath his skin so throughly that Dean thinks no amount of rough salt water should wash him away. He would never want it to, anyway.

Cas simply _fits_ in a way he never should have, but _does,_ and maybe that's a miracle or maybe that's simply chance and chaos at its kindest—Dean doesn't really care. All he cares about is that his mom is happier than she's been in years, because she's able to stop worrying about him so damn much, and though Dean feels the guilt for that still, he's somewhat proud he's at least able to give that to her.

The only thing that could really complete Dean's lucky streak right now is if Cas could meet Sam.

It's been weird since he moved away, to have such an important person in his life at such a physical distance, but it's something he's learned to live with over time. It's even weirder though, to think that _two_ of the more significant people he's ever known have never met _each other._ Coming from a small town, Dean's used to everyone knowing everyone.

He doesn't need Sam's _approval_ , of course, but that doesn't mean he'll ever stop wanting it. He'll admit he was nervous at first of how Sam would take the fact that Cas was a _guy_ , but if his mother was so understanding with the long time coming revelation, he can't imagine Sam would be anything but the same. He also secretly thinks Sam and Cas would really hit it off.

Which is why Dean can't wait for Thanksgiving. The excuse for food around this time of year is always great, but the company this time around will be even better, and his brother will be _home_. In that sense, connecting Cas and Sam feels like it would be finally putting shingles on the roof of the new house that Dean has built, all with his own hands and slowly healing heart.

 

 

***

 

 

He actually doesn't see Cas much at all in the week leading up to the big weekend, which is unusual for his pattern of late. Either he goes over to Cas' when he knows he's off work, Cas crashes at theirs, or Dean hangs out with him downtown when they happen to run into each other. It happens often enough (possibly by Dean's own purposeful frequenting of spots he thinks Cas'll be, but he'll never admit it).

Instead, Dean is kept busy by cleaning up the house. Not that either his mom or him are particularly messy people, but company inspires some scary determination in his mother to make the place impossibly spotless. No amount of “but Sam _lived_ here, he doesn't care” can really deter her. Trust him, Dean's tried.

Though, all in all, Dean doesn't really mind. It gives him an opportunity to hang out with his mom in the main house instead of off in his workshop, and with the knowledge that soon she will have both of her children under the same roof again, his mother is in great, happy spirits.

“Cas is still coming for dinner I'm guessing?” she checks in with him on the Tuesday. Dean is still in that phase of his relationship with Cas that any proud mention of him is liable to make him blush.

“Yeah,” he confirms, but then jokes, “Oh man, I forgot to tell Sam he's been replaced!”, a gentle prod at Mary's own attachment to his new boyfriend. His mother slaps him playfully on the arm for that, but they're both grinning with anticipation.

 

 

***

 

 

Sam arrives the next day, in a horribly hideous rental car that Dean decries as a crime against humanity the moment he sees him. It's his own, loving, brotherly way of saying he's happy to see the six foot five Sasquatch of a creature he calls his one and only favourite brother. Also, a way to say how terrible his car is.

“It's energy efficient!” Sam protests, but he's smiling when he says it, going in for a tight hug, elated to see Dean, too.

They catch up while bringing in Sam's stuff from the car, dumping it carelessly into Sam's old room for him to sort out later. Dean learns of the coolest cases Sam's been working on lately, and this new paralegal named Jess that the firm hired, who _clearly_ Sam's enamoured by.

Dean does _not_ miss this teasing opportunity.

Being his brother, though, Sam can of course give as good as he gets. “Yeah, well, at least I'm _meeting people,_ Grizzly Adams.”

“Hey, what about me says 'Grizzly Adams'? I don't even have a beard!”

“ _Yet_ ,” Sam laughs, and Dean scoffs. He would look damn handsome in a beard if he _did_ grow one, he thinks. Cas would _so_ be into it.

_Cas._

Right, there's that to clear up first.

“I'm, uh, _actuallysortofseeingsomeone?_ ” Dean says quickly and breathlessly, keeping his eyes fixed anywhere but at his brother's face.

“What, really?” Sam asks, voice clearly tinged with surprise, but also a grin, happy to be contradicted. “You back together with Lisa or something?”

It's a fair guess, really, as Dean doesn't have the most illustrious dating history, and he's usually kept to the same people he's always known. His first girlfriend, Cassie, he'd known since he was a little kid, and they'd dated through high school, before she moved away for college. Lisa was his only really serious relationship since, and though Dean's had some dalliances here and there (most notably with a tourist the summer after Cassie moved away; Victor was only in town for a few weeks, so it wasn't meant to last, but it'd been short and sweet and just what Dean had needed at the time), it was never anything permanent, and never anything he'd wanted to share outside of those stolen moments, too anxious that if he did, the illusion would break, and they'd be scared away.

But Cas is different, in a lot of ways, but perhaps most of all in the way that he's unavoidable. He's the sheriff's deputy, and also now somehow _friends with his mom_ (how did that even _happen?_ ), and so even if Dean _tried_ to keep their relationship on the down-low, Sam would probably encounter Cas around anyway, and probably use his weird psychic deductive powers from there.

Dean also doesn't _want_ to hide him.

“No, uh, someone you haven't met, actually,” he tries as a way to ease into things. “They just moved into town a couple months ago.”

“Someone moved to _here_?” Sam asked, amused and incredulous. Of course that would be the thing he would get stuck on. “Wonders never cease.”

“Well, you know, some of us have a soft spot for the backwoods of nowhere kind of life,” Dean defends, but goodheartledly.

“So what's her name?” Sam brings them back on topic, smiling.

Dean winces. He'd never really _come out_ to Sam, so to speak, about swinging both ways. His mom always kind of _knew_ and found out about Victor when Dean'd been kind of broken up that it had ended as fast as it began, but Dean had never really said anything to his brother. Not for the same reasons he'd never said anything to his father, of course, but with Sam, there never seemed to be a right time, and if there ever was, it was interrupted by Sam going off to school, or dad dying and everything going to shit too fast for Dean to feel comfortable interrupting to say 'Oh yeah, I like dudes too'.

“Um, well, his name is Cas. And he's the new deputy, so I'd hold off on any round of family threatening in my honour,” he says, shoulders tense and jaw firm, because he _needs_ Sam to understand this.

Sam is terrifyingly silent for a minute, until he ends Dean's torment with, “I wouldn't _threaten_ him in your honour.”

“Dude, when you were ten you once threatened a seagull for shitting on me.”

“Only _after_ I finished laughing,” Sam points out, laughing again when Dean pulls a wounded face that his pain was ever something to be mocked. Dean eases back, rocking on his heels and enjoying the comfortable banter. God, he's missed his brother.

But one more order of business first: “So, Cas is also coming to dinner,” he says, trying to sound casual, but he's inviting someone home for _Thanksgiving_. They both know how kind of _big_ that is for him.

Sam's eyebrows go up in surprise, but he looks excited. “I get to meet him?”

“Only if you swear to silence about that seagull story,” Dean points a finger at him.

“No promises,” Sam smirks slyly.

“ _Sam._ ”

“ _Fine_ , it's a deal.”

 

 

***

  

 

It's a deal that only lasts as long as it takes for Sam to decide he _really likes_ Cas, and then all sense of decorum and brother blood oaths are thrown out the window.

 

“—And then Dean reaches for his hair and it's _covered_ in white.”

“You are literally the worst brother ever,” Dean grumbles over Mary's laughter and Sam's matching grin. Cas catches his eye and smiles at him kindly, almost as if indication he's sorry that they're having fun at his expense, but that it's not making him think any less of Dean. That he likes these stories and this side of him as much as any other. Dean relaxes into his gaze.

The evening goes as smoothly as Dean could have hoped for. Sam and Cas get along better than could have been imagined: Sam endlessly inquisitive, and Cas always returning with a concise but thoughtful answer.

At the end of the meal, Dean gets up with Cas to see him off, who has to work and early shift tomorrow morning. Cas bids goodbye politely to Dean's family, and then together, Cas collecting his coat, they step outside. The nighttime chill is almost too much for Dean without a jacket of his own, so he crowds in close to Cas' body. You know, for warmth.

One hand stuffed in his pocket, Dean reaches out the other to play with the lower fringe of Cas' open coat. “Thanks for coming, man,” he says, quietly, an intimate expression of gratefulness.

“Thanks for inviting me. It was nice meeting your brother,” Cas adds fondly.

“You like him better or something?” Dean asks, teasing.

Cas' expression is stoic and dead pan. “Impossible. You and I do share a more profound bond.”

“Mmm, _yeah_ we bond profoundly,” Dean murmurs lasciviously, and dives in for a kiss.

What's _impossible,_ Dean thinks, is seeing that serious and vague frowning expression Cas so favours, and being able to resist it.

“Dean—” Cas protests into the kiss, but it's half-hearted. His mouth opens up to Dean's lips, and it's _warmth_ , and wetness, and the lingering taste of desert, which is somehow doubly hot to Dean. He clutches tight to Cas' jacket.

“You should get back to your family,” Cas says breathlessly when the finally break away. Cheeks flushed and eyes alight with desire, Dean can tell he almost wishes he could throw away all obligation and stay. “I'll see you tomorrow.”

Dean drops his hand from his grip on Cas' clothes to stroke a thumb across his friend's lip. Cas stares at him, transfixed, and a feeling surges through Dean that is part power, part profound sense of falling. “I'll hold you to that,” he says, and lets his hand fall, and Cas go out into the night.

“You look happy,” he mother greets him with when he steps back into the house, joining her in the kitchen to help with dishes.

“I'm thankful,” Dean shrugs off, hiding a blush. “It's Thanksgiving!”

Mary smiles knowingly. “It's a good look for you.”

“Yeah, but _everything's_ a good look on you,” Dean says sweetly, and leans down to kiss her on the cheek. He rolls up the sleeve of his over-shirt and takes a cloth that hangs over the handle of the stove, ready to help dry.

 

 

***

 

 

The next few weeks seem to go on only as perfectly as the last. Dean never does get much house work done for Cas, since when they are at his place they're usually preoccupied with more _instant_ gratifications, and the rest of the time they're over at Dean's. Neither really have any complaints as to this complacency, for the now common place comfort of each other's arms has become a bigger priority than tables and chairs. What is the hardwood of furniture next to the hard wood of Cas' cock? Dean badly jokes on more than one occasion.

Winter arrives and wanes in a pretty mild show, mostly manifesting in wet flurries of soppy snow. Dean buys Cas a hat and scarf for Christmas, which sounds like a weak present for someone he's steadily falling in love with, but Dean assures his mother when she raises the question that Cas is very much in need. It figures that a guy with no real domestic amenities would also have no real winter wear.

On New Year's Eve, they get drunk and sappy, and exchange sloppy kisses that turn into sloppy blow jobs that Dean happily declares the best of his life. Castiel, alive on too much wine, smugly decides this is not nearly enough of an accolade, and goes proceeds to go down on him from the other side as well, giving Dean his second orgasm of the night in the first few hours of 2013, tongue licking slow circles around the rim of Dean's ass.

The first words out of Dean's mouth in the new year are a slew of pants of Castiel's name.

It figures, then, that it'd all have to end sometime.

It starts when Dean finds a stone.

 

 

***

 

 

He really didn't think anything at first. A rock is a rock, right? And living by the coast as he always has, Dean's seen plenty of rocks, and _plenty_ of weird ones, washed up on the shore. What is strange, though, is the way the stone, a small, round, dark grey thing—so dark it's almost black—seems to be a special keepsake of Castiel's.

He always takes it out when he thinks no one is looking, twirling it in his long, strong fingers. Dean always gets distracted more by the motion of Cas' hands when he takes it out (especially once he's become intimately familiar with how those fingers feel pressed into his skin), so sue him, so it's awhile into their relationship before he ever notices that the otherwise smooth surface of the stone is indeed not unblemished, and displays very minute, intricate carvings.

Dean rarely gets a good look, before Cas re-pockets his little, secret treasure, but he's spied it enough times now out of the corner of his eye to recognise the carved lines as a swirling pattern, not unlike, he thinks, something he's seen before.

The precise connection niggling at the back of his mind for weeks doesn't click until he's back at Bobby's one day, doing research for more inspiration for his table design, and notices something suspiciously similar in a large, thick tome of maritime myths that was always his favourite as a child.

He also doesn't really think bringing it up to Cas would spark anything much more than a shrug or a piqued interest in Dean's findings, but perhaps he doesn't know Cas at all like he thought he did, because rather than a passing acknowledgement of Dean's benign observation, Cas' eyes _immediately_ shutter and sharpen.

“What are you talking about?” he demands stiffly.

“The rock you keep in your pocket,” Dean repeats. When Cas' face betrays nothing, staying silent, Dean sighs and walks over to reach into Cas' pocket before Cas even realises what he's doing. “This?” he waves it in front of his face.

Castiel's gaze remain steely and guarded. His stance has turned to one as rigid as a soldier's. “What about it?”

Dean has no idea why he's taking this all so seriously. He'd obviously guessed the stone meant something to his friend, but to be so aggressively defensive over an object when Castiel usually cares so little for materiality is incongruous with Dean's image of him.

“Nothing,” Dean huffs. “Just noticed the cool design on it was just like something I saw at Bobby's in one of his books. Thought you might be interested. _My mistake,_ ” he bites, indignant.

Cas' mouth tightens as he grabs the stone out of Dean's grasp, and encloses it fully in his fist. “Yes,” he says tersely. “It is.”

He walks over to his desk, cluttered and surrounded with tipping stacks of books finally removed from their boxes, and opens the lid of a small, nondescript wooden jewellery box. Dean gapes after him as he places the stone inside, out of Dean's reach and sight. A surge of anger swells up in Dean, because how dare Castiel be so rude to him when he was only trying to share in a discovery?

“ _Hey,_ ” he calls to Cas' back, as he steps towards him, refusing to let tis go now that Castiel has made it such a big deal. “If you have a problem with me why don't you just—”

Castiel will never know what Dean was going to say. For as soon as Dean steps up to Castiel, still standing at the side of his desk, jewellery box open beneath his hands, all speech is stolen from him. Because there, inside that box next to Castiel's mysterious treasure, Dean sees what is absolutely, _unmistakably_ his Dad's missing wedding ring.

 

 

***

 

 

“Why _the fuck_ do you have my dad’s ring?” Dean finds himself saying, when he's regained his voice. His hands are fisted at his side and his jaw clenches and unclenches with anxious and angry energy.

He doesn't bother with explanations over how his father lost it, because if Cas has it, if _Cas_ , who has become _so much_ to Dean in the past months, has been holding it all this long while, he must know _something_. And Dean needs to know what that is.

Castiel turns to face him, shut off eyes now turned softer, sympathetic. Dean doesn't want _any_ of it, not when a huge lie is exploding up around him and everything he thought he knew is being turned to just another heap of dust on Castiel's floor.

“Dean—”

“No, no Cas,” he laughs hollowly, cutting off any evasion Castiel might have presented before he can utter it. “You’re explaining this _right fucking now_ or I swear to God—”

“I’m not human,” Cas says suddenly.

Dean's anger halts and derails for a moment, entirely taken aback. Did he even hear that right? “ _What?_ ” he snaps, angry again that something so absurd is what Castiel would offer to him, taking him for a fool.

Castiel takes in a deep breath as if to rally himself for some shattering truth. “I’m not human, this—this _form_ you see me in now is not what I’ve always been,” he says, holding Dean's fiery gaze with a steady, calm wash of blue.

“And what the hell were you before?” he scoffs back, indulging him for just a second, because beyond the anger, he still just wants to _understand._

“Your culture calls us selkies,” Castiel continues, as if that's a totally normal thing to say, and Dean has fucking _had_ it.

“What?” he repeats, daring Castiel to take him for a fool again.

“It’s from the old Scots—”

Dean punches him.

 

 

***

 

 

He didn't really _mean_ to knock Cas out cold, but, well. Dean _does_ have a pretty good swing, and when aggravated enough it becomes unleashed. At least Dean was kind enough to move him off the floor after, and onto that stupid, awful couch.

Dean huffs as he sits down on the floor in front of him—not like there's any space on the couch.

He can't believe Cas hasn't replaced this pathetic sofa yet. Maybe because it's too sentimental now, since it was the lucky site of their first desperate humping session. But that memory, he thinks bitterly, that was once the start of something amazing for Dean, lies tarnished on the floor as he himself now does.

Was any part of _them_ even real?

“Dean...?” Cas groans as he begins to stir.

Dean looks up from his lap as Cas comes to and sits up, holding his aching head between his hands. A part of Dean wants to go to him, hold him, but the bigger, wounded part of him stays silent and put.

After a moment, Castiel looks up at him, too. “Dean, I'm so sorry. I never meant for you to find out like this,” he says, and there is plain honesty in his voice. But Dean can't be sure of anything anymore.

“You never meant for me to find out at all, you mean,” he accuses.

“That's not true,” Cas says quietly. “I was only... waiting. For the right time,” he adds, shaking his head as he sighs and drops his imploring stare. “I didn't want to upset what we had built together by such an unbelievable revelation.”

“ _'Unbelievable'_ is right,” Dean scoffs.

Castiel slides off the couch onto his knees, thumping down next to Dean on the hard, wooden floor. Inwardly Dean winces at the impact. That'll give him bruises in the morning, he thinks. “Dean,” he begins, stretching a hesitating hand out to reach for him, but then at the last second pulling back. He rests his idle hands on his thighs as he catches Dean's eyes again and says, “You have to believe me when I say I never meant to hurt you.”

Oh, he _has_ to?

“Yeah?” Dean snaps. “And why should I buy that? Why should I buy that you're some...” he trails off, waving his hand in a quickly aborted gesture ,at a loss for words. “Some—some seal fairy creature who, what, was there when my dad died _six years ago?_ ” Dean can barely believe the words that are coming out of his _own_ mouth. His heart pounds and yearns for Castiel to contradict him, to say this was all some _joke._

“Yes,” he says instead.

Dean shakes his head. “That's too much, Cas.”

On his knees, Castiel shuffles closer. “Now you know that I was there that night, I can tell you that I was also the one that found you,” he says, voice low and pleading, aching for Dean to understand.

“What?” Dean blinks.

“Your father, I was too late to save. His lungs were full of water by the time I got close to your boat. You though, I was there when you were thrown into the water, and I carried you on my back to shore.”

This is all too much for Dean to take. If he thought the revelation that Castiel was witness to his father's death was some anvil of a secret, it's nothing compared to this. Castiel _saved_ him? It would sound preposterous if it weren't exactly what he'd also been doing since he moved into this house.

Dean takes a moment to catch steady his heartbeat, racing at the pace of an exhilarating, gruelling marathon run. “What about the ring?” he finally asks, needing that one piece of information to slide into place before he can make a full picture of it all in his head. “It wasn't—it wasn't with my dad when I found him. Did you steal it?”

“No. I only found it days later myself, sunken to the ocean floor. By the time I returned to the beach to where I had left you, you were gone, and I had no idea where to.”

“So what, you... became human to find me?”

Castiel breathes out hard through his nose, move curled down in a frown, as he ponders his answer.

“Initially, yes,” he says. “I had no idea who you were, of course, but I had not been so close to humans in hundreds of years, since the last time I wandered ashore, and the sight of you in the water caught me. I could not look away,” he recounts, voice draped in a wonder Dean wishes he couldn't hear. It reminds him of the way Castiel used to say his name at night, and he can't be thinking of that now.

“I tried to forget you,” he continues, “but finding you father's ring only reminded me of my distraction. I yearned to discover what your world was like.”

There's one more thing Dean is unsure of, though. “And the stone?”

“It is... me, I suppose. Selkies do not shed their skin literally, as your lore might think. We can transfer the energy of what we are into any object, a stone just happened to be the closest thing to me. With my... _essence_ encased within it, I am effectively human,” he says. Dean looks at his hands then, lying on this thighs, hands that Dean has touched and guided and let inside him in every way, literal and metaphorical. They look human, breathtakingly so, but Dean always thought they were so elegant as to be god-like. Unreal, almost, in their tender, sure touch. Apparently, his gut wasn't that far off.

“And it took you _six years_ to walk a couple miles up the coast,” he says, a statement more than a question.

“As I said, I had no idea who you were, or how far you had sailed from. When I arrived up on the land in my new body, I found myself at a loss of how to find you, or where to go. So I simply started running.”

“For six years.”

“Well, I eventually found my place. A driver took me for a hitchhiker, offered to drive me into the city. I tried to make a life for myself first, so I might have the means to find you. I went into law enforcement so I might have access to records, information,” he explains.

Dean swallows hard, and closes his eyes. “This is so fucking weird,” he mumbles to himself at first, and then opens his eyes again, now more guarded, to say, “And creepy. So what, you been stalking me? Our whole... relationship is just some sort of _experiment_ for you, a _vacation?_ ” Dean almost hates himself for saying it—Hell, he certainly hates himself for _buying_ it, because of _course_ nothing this good could have come without a caveat.

“Oh, no, Dean, no,” Castiel is quick to say. “I admit, my arrival in your town at first was inspired by my search for you, to return to you your father's ring, but when I met you...” he trails off.

“What?”

“Everything changed.”

“How?” Dean holds his breath. His answer won't change anything of what Dean knows he has to do, leave and recoil and think for a good long while, but he _needs_ to hear it, none the less.

Castiel's face is open and sincere as it can possibly be when he looks at him. The lines around his eyes make him look impossibly old in this light, and Dean supposes he _is._ But his face also changes when he utters his next words, as if the sentiment within them makes him timeless, immortal.

“I fell in love with you.”

 

 

***

 

 

Mermaids and sea monsters might not be a myth anymore, but those _good things_ Cas had tried to tell him about months ago certainly were. In the end, everything turns to dust, or is swallowed by the sea.

Castiel leaves Dean alone on his living room floor that night, too afraid to touch or talk much after their conversation. But before he goes, disappears up to his bedroom Dean supposes, he leaves in Dean's hand a keepsake, a choice: the stone.

It seems almost innocuous as a gesture, a pathetic sort of apology, but in the context of all the revelations of the past few hours, it means everything. It means _too much_ , since it means Cas has just placed his essence, his _life force_ in Dean's hands as if it should _belong_ to him, and that's too much of a weight to take right now. It's a cruel burden to place on his shoulders after such a thick veil of lies has been pulled back.

Dean raises his arm to throw the stone at the wall in anger, but feeling tired and defeated, he can't quite bring himself to. His arm drops. He pockets the rock instead, and then begins his long exodus home.

It will be cold tonight, he thinks. Colder than he's ever been. Distantly, he can here the crash of the waves down at the waterfront, and a chill runs through him.

 


	3. The Sapphire

 

  

_June, 2006_

 

The sounds of thunder in the sky are so loud they even resound beneath the surface of the sea. The vicious booming echoes in cacophonous harmony with the cracking of the waves, heavy tides big enough to swallow souls whole. Castiel flicks his fins trough the frigid waters of the deep.

Castiel sees the belly of boat before he sees the first body fall from it. A dark shadow rocking back and forth, he wonders why any human vessel would dare brave the ocean in this weather. He preemptively mourns the disaster that's sure to come.

When the first body falls he's still too far way to even fully take account how big the hull is. He flutters his fins faster, racing against the clock of death, but he fears before he even reaches them that he will be too late.

Castiel's instincts are not wrong.

By the time he's close enough, he just _knows_ the human in the water is dead. It's not an empirical observation, but something he just knows at his core, deep within himself. There is no help he can offer him.

When the second body hits the water, however, Castiel is able to act quickly. He hears the muffled splash and darts upwards to stall its descent, catching the other man on his back.

Later, he almost doesn't remember his journey to the surface, nor his hauling to the beach, or his desperate lugging back of the deceased body he's sure will be missed by the unconscious, but mercifully alive human sleeping on the sand.

 

 

***

 

 

_June, 2006 (A Few Days Later)_

 

It's still raining when Castiel sheds his skin, speckled seal flesh turning to something soft and beige, grey to yellow. He's not done this in hundreds of years, come ashore in human form, but his muscles remember the process. His power needs to be kept somewhere, and it will be within the first stone he picks up, turning a deep, dark, black-purple in the process.

He shivers in his naked human skin, cold in the rain. He knows he risks becoming ill, without the flubber and thick skin of a seal to guard him now. But he has to do this. Long has he been entranced by humans, but never has he had the chance to _save_ one. He recalls the face of the younger man from days before, almost serene as the storm howled above his sleeping form.

Castiel knew to leave, then, return to the sea before he was caught by fascination, but something about that man's face captured his heart too thoroughly. A fisherman indeed, he must have been, for Castiel to willing swim into his net of the sand and beach himself like he has. What a marvel this human has been, to entice Castiel to _stay._

 

 

***

 

 

_June, 2013_

Castiel departs for several months, after Dean leaves his house that night. He goes back to the city he first settled in on leave, to give Dean some space. He knows he'll have to return, whatever Dean's decision to trust him or not. He has a job there now, a _life,_ and indeed friends outside of Dean. But if he can give Dean anything of what he deserves, it's time, and space.

He returns in the summer, hoping Dean's anger might have relaxed into a gentler reaction, but at the very least knows he must return to face his potential rejection either way. Dean still has his skin, after all. He still has the stone.

He expects Dean's cold greeting when he first sees him, at Harvelle's Roadhouse like old times.

What he doesn't expect though is the lingering longing, the stolen glances out of the corners of his eyes when he thinks Castiel has heeded his rejections of silence. A renewed hope swells in Castiel's too human chest, and for the first time, in a long time, he's grateful for his choice.

“You know, that was kind of a shitty thing to leave me with,” is the first thing Dean says to him after weeks and weeks of separation. It's accusing, angry, but in a way it almost seems like Dean's trying to _reach out_ to him too, in his defensiveness.

“What?”

“Your life, your—” Dean grunts in frustration at himself, trying to find the right words. He reaches out into his pocket, and clatters the fateful stone onto the countertop. “You left me with _you_ , Cas. A part of you to control. But I don't—I don't want to _control_ you.”

Castiel had not seen it like that. He didn't mean to be a burden to Dean, a black spot on his conscience. When he'd left his skin in Dean's hands as he sat on the floor of his living room, Castiel was making his _own_ choice to trust Dean, not trying to make one on Dean's behalf. But perhaps this free will thing works in more complex ways then Castiel can sometimes grasp in the moment, in his selfish, fleeting desires to instantly _belong._

“What do you want, then, Dean?” he asks, because he feels like this is a question Dean does not hear enough. He remembers the first time he'd uttered these words to this man, in his home during a storm like the _real_ first time they'd met. Something like lighting strikes his heart again, for his pulse quickens.

“I want to choose _you_. I want you to choose _m_ e. This?” He places he stone in Cas' hand. “This is _yours,_ your skin, our your soul or whatever. It shouldn't belong to anyone but _you_.”

The implication is a heavy physical weight. Dean is right, of course, it's a part of him, no regular object to be handed off lightly. But still, he thought he'd understood what it meant to leave it with him.

“But what if I left again?” he wonders aloud, uncertain. Would Dean still hold him in his heart if Cas had the full ability to leave?

“Then you leave,” Dean tells him simply, resigned. “I don't _want_ you to, but,” He bites his lip. “I couldn't stand the idea that I was someone _keeping_ you here. I just want you to _stay_ here, instead.”

Castiel is shocked at first, to hear such a bear admission fall from Dean's lips so willingly, but he soon nods in understanding. It's what he finds his heart was yearning to hear all along, and suddenly the air he breathes in feels clearer, fresher, unburned by the miasma of guilt and regret.

“I can do that, I think.”

“Yeah?” Dean perks up, his shoulders settling from their taut stance.

“Dean Winchester,” Castiel says, a name he will never tire of forming on his lips. “I'll never tire of choosing you.”

Dean huffs, but his eyes are no longer shuttered, closed off. The corners of them crinkle. “Still into the consolation prizes, huh?”

“Perhaps some loss suits me better if it wins me this,” Castiel says, and he can see the last defensive walls between him and Dean shatter.

“Now's the part where we kiss, I guess,” Dean says, shifting closer. The heat of his body is a magnet to Castiel's own.

The cold, soaked sea was his home for so long, but this furnace of an earth-man is a second coming of a hearth. Dean Winchester is something like a sun, in every metaphorical sense.

Dean laughs. “You know, if we want to get all chick flick about it,” he adds, giving Castiel one last, subtle out. He has no need for it.

Castiel smiles. His heart and face ache with the same sentiment. Human skin is a marvel in that way, that happiness can be such a pleasant pain.

“That I can do as well.”

 

 

 

***

 

 

"I didn't steal your skin, Cas," Dean whispers in the dark later, into Castiel's skin as his hairs stand on end.

Castiel shuts his eyes against the night. "Oh no, no you did so much worse than that. You stole what was under it, and now I can never go back." Not that he would want to.

Dean laughs into his lips. "So I stole you from the sea, huh? What do your legends say about you stealing me?"

Castiel's heart hammers and his chest tenses, but his lungs feel light and full of air, buoyed by such intense _relief_ at feeling _free_ again, free and yet comfortably tethered to this man who no longer cares that he used to be something of an angel, for all his magic and mystery in his last life. He doesn't care because it doesn't matter now, here, in this bed, where Castiel's body cleaves into his. Their touches spark like lighting and their bodies thrum with thunder and it is a fantastical storm of hormones and emotion as they kiss and move and kiss.

"Maybe—maybe we weren't robbed of ourselves, maybe we chose this," he says. Maybe they'd chosen each other. His hands splay open against the expanse of Dean's back, mapping his skin as he's done, over and over again. He'll never be tired of it, for every new touch yields a new discovery, a new landmark revelation that there is no place Castiel would rather be.

"You choose me, I choose you, Pikachu?”

"I don't understand that reference," Castiel says, and Dean laughs, and laughs, and laughs. The sound echoes in Castiel's ears.

It sounds like coming home.

 

 

 

***

 

 

Castiel moves again in late May, a year from the day Dean met him for the second time, seven years from the first.

It isn't as difficult this time, what with the help of Dean in his truck and Jody in her own pick-up. It wasn't like he had anything much but books to move in anyway, and they would find as good a home as Castiel himself, on newly sanded and stained shelves Dean had made special for the occasion.

The evening after all the boxes are unloaded finds Castiel out by the seaside, arms crossed over thick, red woollen sweater—a gift from Mary. The water is calm today, lapping at the shore in a lulling sound that speaks of easy weather through the night. Still, there is a light breeze, rippling his hair into disarray and sending the salty breeze from below to settle in Cas' mouth and lungs.

He takes a deep breath.

Castiel kisses Dean on the doorstep before he re-enters. Having come from the shed, Dean smells like soil and sawdust, and smiling into his mouth, Castiel thinks the taste of the land on his tongue might be an acquired taste, but one he's come to crave all the same.

The table gets finished by the time autumn rolls around, with Dean proudly unveiling the finished work in an impromptu ceremony in his workshop, attended by Castiel and Mary. Dean smooths his hand over the finished surface and smiles at his family, and Castiel, he smiles just was widely back.

“You're a true artist,” Castiel says appreciatively, when Mary has left them alone to go make tea up in the house.

Dean ducks his head and blushes. “Nah, I'm just a guy with a good hobby. And good inspiration,” he adds, when he looks back up.

“Are you saying I've become your muse these past months?” Castiel smirks. He's teasing, though the thought does charm him, if he's honest.

“Well, to do you justice there should be _a lot_ more nudity carved into here, but well. Can't be perfect,” Dean jokes back.

“In that case, we might celebrate its completion with nudity on top of it,” Castiel suggests. Dean's delight and self-satisfaction in this moment is a beauty to behold, and Castiel wants to bask in its light.

They christen the project hastily and messily, with their pants shoved down to their ankles, but it's something of a divine moment for them both. Castiel reach into the water once to save this soul, but he thinks in a way Dean has saved him, too. He has shown him _life,_ _zeal,_ and Castiel thinks that if the myths and legends about selkies were true, that they are all just fallen angels, then he has fallen hard indeed, for Dean. The table is sturdy beneath them and the Earth is kind and unyielding beneath their feet, but his soul flies fluid through his finger tips as he presses his appreciation into Dean's lips.

 

 

***

 

 

 

 

 

***


End file.
